Value of a 340

340 for real power, short stroke, perfect rod ratio. It was built to be bad ***. Besides if your replacing a 318, do you really want to worry about adding cost for an externally balanced vibration dampner, Flywheel, or flexplate. Also unless your doing a stroker crank, you are dealing with a cast crank on a 360 and 72 and later 340's. Steel crank on the good old 340's '68-'71. That means durability to me. There are the pros. Big blocks shouldn't even be considered in a a-body, unless it's a 68 ss/a car. I have blowed the doors off so many big block cars in my years of racing, it makes the Big block guys cry. Especially today with all the choices in stroker kits giving you 408-440 cubic inches. It's unreal. I was doing it 10-20 years ago with 323 cubic inches and a set of W-2's. It's just funnier doing it with S.B. power...