276 stroker from 35 years of parts

[GB SISSON]

Well this is not at all what I expected to find. This is with a used head gasket that measures .062 everywhere on it. I took one of the new Best composition headgaskets and it it unused, uncompressed and it also measures .062. I ran the test on #5 and #8 and both had a good portion at .025 squish. I have no interest running on the ragged edge of valve and piston clearance. I got out my other set of EAB heads that were more crusty. I didn't want to set them on my pristine short block so I did some measuring with my dial indicator. These seem to be heavily surfaced too. (Both from the same source and orange paint). When placed upside down, all 4 EAB heads show a space almost 3/8" between a new gasket and the factory milled dome. In other words, 3/8" milled flat 'eyebrow' showing. I then grabbed an 8ba head and flipped it and tried the head gasket. The combustion chamber area lined up perfectly with the domed area in head. No eyebrow.I have a nice looking pair of 8cm heads and various 8ba's as well. I think I saw that the copper clad head gaskets were maybe .070, but when squished we still don't gain enough. Perhaps I have made some newbie error, but those foil balls sure looked flat to me.