hey guys i'm looking for some advice on my TA. I Have a 78 TA 4-speed 6.6 w72/ws6 all stock with 65000 original miles on it. I would like to beef it up this month, but I am new to hotrod scene and my old man is a chevy guy... so i'm looking for some help.. This is a #'s matching car so i dont really want to shave or mill anything. I'd like to put Dougs headers(are there better ones?) and duals exausts on it, cam it up(not sure what cam?), rebuild the carb(not sure what kind of rebuild?), open up the shaker hood.. any more suggestions... i like to beef it up as much as possible without milling/shaving the heads or block.let me know what you guys think.. thanks jesse  

If you want to keep your TA looking original, and I can understand why, I would go with a cam swap and exhaust as you have suggested. I assume you don't intend to rebuild the motor, just do some bolt-ons so I would go with a cam like the Pontiac 068 or a similar spec from one of the good cam companies such as COMP or Crane, the 068 is available thru most of the resto parts suppliers (Year One, Classic Industries, Ames etc.) and is a good idling stick with great power potential for a mild motor such as yours and is a great improvement over the stock cam. For exhaust I personally don't like headers for the installation and maintenance hassles they bring, however Doug's, Hedman or Hooker are good brands. You can upgrade to RA III mainfolds from Ram Air Restoration or Year One, but the stock ones will work well too. For exhaust systems there are nice kits from Flowmaster and a really nice kit from Pypes- it has 2.5" mandrel bent pipes, includes and X crossover and your choice of mufflers and there are optional head pipes for either stock log manifolds or the Ram Air manifolds available as well as optional chrome splitter tips or Super Duty straight tips. It's a bit pricey but I spent almost $600 on a muffler shop bent 2.25" system with the factory 2" tailpipes and splitters and the guy welded the mufflers on (after I told him I wasn't sure if they'd be too loud). So the cost isn't all that bad. Don't swap the intake, for your combo the stock one is fine and the only real world advantage to an Edelbrock Performer is the weight. Check the ads in HPP for Q-jet shops and they will point you in the right direction. Hope this helps!  

thanks barney for gettimg back to me so soon..