Hardened valve seats - do they really matter?

Princess Valiant said

Yea, as I read through the comments more, I think I'm just going to use the head as is and later when I find a 73 and up head with the factory hardened valve seats, I'll mill that one and swap them out.

I plan to daily drive the car as I have daily driven several old mopars already and I like to tow my little mower trailer around and let the car be a car and do car stuff.

Click to expand...

I purchased a set of Slanty main studs off of a Member here, He has a set of the 1.70"/1.44" stainless EngineBuilder valves, & a set of 340HP springs that I passed on. Most aftermarket stainless valves come with stems that are .001-.002" under stock stem sizes, so if the guides have any wear of note they'll need lined or replaced, but I'm not sure about the EB ones. More importantly, replacing the stock valves w/quality stainless ones greatly reduces the need for hardened seats.