thanks, thats alot of helpful info!!! with the kb167s do i need to zero the deck or would that be just in the effort to hit that 400hp mark? if not would the block still need to be line honed and square decked?
It depends how tall the deck on your 318 is. More than likely, the KB167's would still end up being a few thousandths below the deck. Probably not a big deal for your build, and still a huge improvement over stock. On the other hand, zero decking the block shouldn't be a ton of money, and in addition to improving the compression ratio it will improve the quench, which will make things more efficient. Plus, if you decided later to upgrade your heads you'd have a better set up to do that.
Regardless, I would still have it square decked (which might put the pistons pretty darn close to zero deck anyway), just so that everything is the same side to side. A line hone probably isn't necessary unless you're going to switch from the stock main bolts to studs, in which case it would be a good idea.
