Need 318 help/advice
DO a compression test!
Lets see how bad it is.
Bottom end is mostly about having the pressure, and having it peak at the right crank-position. You can bandaid it with a hi-stall and gears, but without the pressure it will still be lazy.
And if your power band gets to be 3500 to 6000, in a streeter, IMO: that's crazy. With 3.91s in Second gear, that is from about 50 to 86 mph. IMO, for a streeter, you need the power at from 30 to 50/55 maybe as high as 60, but the last 4/5mph, with good heads, can be on the downside of the power curve. After that, it's nice to have tire-shredding from a dead-stop capability, but that's not mandatory.. But just chirping, I agree, sucks no matter what.
Had a cam that was too big for what I wanted (didn't want to idle, exh. smelled like unburnt fuel due to what I was told was the cam overlap?
If the cam was smaller than the 292/292/108 Mopar cam,both of those can easily be tuned out. I had that cam in my 360 and it putted around the parking lot at 550 rpm with 5* advance in 2.66 low gear with 3.55s in the back. It sounded great!
With your new 274 cam and lo-stall, yur still gonna need a bunch of cylinder pressure, and now, timing will be much more important.
DO a compression test!
Lets see how bad it is.