What are the symptoms of a bad torque converter?

You have a very similar setup to me, same intake, cam, headers, except I have a 360 with eddy heads. Once you got the 3.55s were you a lot happier with the car?

It may even have 2.76 gears, that seems more likely. It's revving at about 1700 rpm going 70 miles/hr. Because from a stop it's doggy, but when I'm cruising around in second and step on it so it downshifts it snaps your head back. It's weird though, the car is pretty fast up to speed just not for that brief moment in first. I guess it makes sense the gears are killing it.

Right now it's the stock 7 1/4 that was in the car, I have an 8 3/4 I'm going to put in, I will find a third member with some good gears, 3.91s would be nice, and should help with the getup. It also has 255 rear tires on the rear, so a lot of traction.

So would a good set of gears and a possibly a custom built converter make it fast from a stop too?