Hmm... depends on the age of the engine and how far you want it to travel. If it has under about 20k miles on it since the last rebuild you might be able to go with just honing it enough to brake the glaze. BUT: this is very difficult because:
1) you have to get all the grit out of the engine without any getting in any oil galleries or some sort of plave you don't want it.
2) honing makes a horrible mess, you can't actually do it with the engine in the car.
3) without honing, your rings won't seat properly. Wear will be very high at the beginning and if you have just a small ridge it might kill a compression ring, and then
In other words: if you know what you're doing and trust your abilities (I read you're a mechanic), then you can try. Make a small mistake (grit in the oil, ridge, wrong honing...) you'll lose that engine in under 10k miles...
Always remember: you can only chose two of the following:
good - cheap - fast
I would use a vortec top end, maybe a holley 4Di injection off ebay or something, they come quite cheap and can be set by computer, then you don't need to fool around with needles etc to get the best out of a carb. If you don't find a Vortec, go for closed chamber heads like the 492 or 041 or 186 or similar, they also flow very well and are easily obtainable off ebay for as low as 300 bucks a pair rebuilt... Heads can also be bought off ebay used, as a mech you can rebuild them yourself. A new cam will make a good difference, but be sure not to go too far on the duration as it will kill low end power and driveability. Maybe put higher gears in. What trans are you using? What gears you use depends a lot on the tranny and the lowest ratio you have there to get you off the line. Don't overdo the static compression ratio, otherwise you'll want a longer cam, which kills low end again. And it's almost always better to go for flat tops and small chambers, you get better burn because there's no dome to mask the spark plug at TDC
Plan first, build then
Hope I could help you out a bit,
Max