I'm glad you bring up these clearance issues, these are things I should indeed be looking into, especially weather I will be able to use that crank from the L99.

I feel a bit like a fool, I didn't explain that I wasn't planning on using the L99 pistons, simply the crank and rods, but I'm unsure as to weather the rods will even clear the cam or fit the pistons anyways, I guess I must do this methodically, start with a 3" crank that will work, then find rods that will fit the crank and clear the cam, then find pistons which will fit both the rods and play nice with the heads.

I remember the original cranks changed between different years of production, that journal size is pretty important, I'll make SURE to match them prior to buying if I go with a 1960s style 3" crank, you say I might actually be able to order one? Would it be reproduction or refurbished? Custom reproduction may be useful if I chose to go for stronger internals, but that means more money.

Forgive me for sounding ignorant but I've only been dealing with aftermarket rods up until now and this is my very FIRST build, aren't my stock 350 rods 5.7"? Doubtful on how well they would hold up if I reused them though, the engine will be pushing high revs on a regular basis, hopefully not killing it's longevity too much...

I would love it if I managed to keep excellent breathing/torque/power while maintaining a tame compression, I'd like to run it on regular gas even? (embarassing, but even mileage is nice these days). The car is going to be a daily driver that I can take to the strip to shake things up whenever it strikes me(I'm looking at 2800lbs after the swap on a FAT day, even with iron heads), so I'd prefer to keep compression and powerband streetable while still running some nice high RPM muscle under the deck.

Hopefully with some legwork and some phone calls things will begin to come together in the next little while, at least some outlying details and parts sources, possibly even cold hard parts numbers. Like I said before, I'm aiming for the end result to be a streetable but beastly engine, it is a 302 after all and I feel responsible to make it live up to the pedigree at least a LITTLE bit. So more than anything I hope the resulting power will be enough to justify the lengths gone into creating such a one-off example. At the same time I'm really looking for an engine that will stick around and be somewhat practical (mileage that doesn't make you grimace, all-racing powerband etc.) because it's a pretty big investment from my standpoint, and I hope to use it for a while, you get attatched to these big hunks of metal.