I disagree. IMO the VS Holley is worthless. And a properly tuned Holley will make more power and not give up anything to any Carterbrock, QJ or TQ.
The biggest issue with the Holley and all the clones is all the misinformation, disinformation and downright ignorance of how any carb functions, let alone a Holley. Rivers of ink have been spilled writing books by different authors who all repeat the same crap. And then it gets handed down via magazine articles, forums and such.
I am amazed at how much time and effort people spend learning EFI, yet they didn’t spend 1% of that time learning carburation. I suggest it’s because for decades they have been told carb tuning is a “mystery” filled with voodoo and one must be adept in conjuring the spirts of carb tuners long past. And that isn’t the case at all.
The other issue is this, and I point this out because you suggested the VS as an alternative as does David Vizard and a host of others.
All of the carbs designed and built by Holley (and now the clones regardless of the name on the box it comes out of) that were “street” carbs had a very clean tune (for lack of a better term) that were far better suited to street use than the “universal” performance carbs they made and still make.
For example, if you went out and bought a brand new 3310 it has an entirely different tune in it than the same carb (4779) in a 750 double pumper. And it showed in all around driveability, fuel consumption, hot starting and even WOT.
The Holley, by design or engineering mistake all get rich as the RPM goes up at a far greater rate than other brands of carbs. It’s relatively common knowledge that a Holley is rich at idle, lean in the middle and fat up top most of the time.
All the “universal” performance Holley carbs come with a very fat tune on every circuit to begin with and they always had bigger jets than its street carb equivalent.
Had Holley and all the writers, tuners and such had taught even the most rudimentary principles of carburation rather than sit on the knowledge for whatever reason the end user could have made an educated decision when buying a carb rather than listening to the stooge behind the parts counter (who also was never trained in carburation) or relying on magazine articles and such to pick a carb.
Even the Holley charts used today to pick a carb are wrong. It’s no wonder the Holley is universally hated by those who never spent the time to understand carburation, even on the most basic level.
I never advise anyone to use a VS carb for anything. There are much better choices IF the end user is willing to learn, or pay someone to get the carb tuned.