LA 318 advice

you're worried to death about a point or so of compression but haven't addressed the cam what so ever.

are you keeping what's in there? if so, what is it?

if you aren't, then there's a whole wide world of options to wade thru. there are a bunch of key factors that would weigh heavily on cam choice: vehicle weight (from my understanding it's in a 32 pickup?), transmission, gears, use/driving style.

you can build a mean little ripper with so called dog water compression and the right cam, intake and carb (and headers). it'd be no fun in a big ol' boat but in something light it'd do just fine and dandy.