Doesn't surprise me, Early A stuff is always like that.
I would say now would be a good time to do a ford 8.8 swap. I did that with my valiant wagon.
If anything you're helping me clear out my early A stuff. I think I am going to set that half a 66 barracuda on a trailer tomorrow and send it off to scrap, There's nothing good left and now that the 7.25 rear of it is going to be stripped out...:p
At least it's supposed to be a warm weekend and it's not going to be my turn to be called into work because the other girl I work with, It's her weekend, if they need someone called in. So it will be nice to get this done and work on my 67 valiant dash some more.