340 or 440

By starting with a 400; I meant Starting with a 400 and building it for street performance, and
By feathering the throttle; I meant cuz that 400 will be a torque-monster with a small streetcam.
Being heavy on the torque, it won't need the usual band-aides of stall and gears. Nor an overdrive. Sorry if that wasn't clear.

I was happy with my previous combo, 337 hp by the 106 trap speed. And I don't know what that 360 had for torque but it was a beast of a SBM. I can't see a hi-compression 400 not making at least 337, probably with the smallest street cam you can find, and lotsa more torque than that 360, and sooner. Ima thinking along the same lines as you, but with the torque of a Hi-C 400, Ima thinking 2.94s are plenty enough gear to have fun with, yet 32mph is ~3000rpm in 2.45 first gear, and 65=2375@ zero-slip, so right away you got 3 outta 4 bases covered. The fourth is fuel mileage and at ~2400, it will surely be better than a 360 with a 276* cam and 3.55s jamming down the hiway at 65=2870@zero-slip.

Since boring and pistons cost about the same, and aluminum heads are now not required with a 400, I woulddabin lotsa bucks ahead with the 400. Even if I had to cough up a bit of cash for a core , I wouldda still spent less money, and got similar trapspeed, while enjoying all the tire-frying torque. I mean like I said, I was happy with a 106 trapspeed. And we haven't even talked about a stroker,lol.