596 casting or 308 casting for mild 360 4bbl

Thank you for well thought out replies and the advice,

Ultimately wat I am looking for is power under the curve and a nice fat powerband. Now I learned years ago that horsepower is for race cars torque is what is what rules the street. Horsepower, after all, is just a mathematical derivative of torque.

Now I know that you can either build torque or you can multiply what you already have I.E. deeper gears, I may have misspoken when I said gears are next after the engine I meant that the will gears be upgraded next but after the engine is back together but before the car hits the road again.

My plan for the heads are to concentrate on the bowl area, pockets as the factory back cut is less than ideal, the heads will be milled and a thinner head gasket used to help DCR trying to get to 9 to 1 if I can having the heads milled and running a .028 head gasket.

The ports are not bad as cast just need a little cleaning up.

My main concern would be not trading a few cfm for a loss in velocity as this will kill torque and more the powerband up in rpm's

I want to see most of my improvements in the low to mid lift range I could care less what the heads flow at .500 or what my peak power looks like I am building for a nice fat useable power at rpm's that are reasonable for a daily driver.

My original question was between the 596 heads and the 308's what is a better starting point?

My conclusion thus far is that the 308's offer a slight advantage on the exhaust side but this is countered by the fact that I already have the 596's and the 308's in the local yard are in unknown condition.

Thanks for again one and for the advice and let me know if you have any thoughts on my plane listed above.