Well, it's in and running. Drove it around town today and was mostly pleased. After a quick repair of the original BBS accelerator pump (the check ball retainer had become dislodged) and a final application of the timing light it's pretty respectable. Quiet, smooth acceleration, no smoke, smooth shifting, good kickdown, etc.
It starts right up after sitting around, but...it does still have a cooling issue that we can't seem to understand. It starts and then shortly thereafter, it heats up to to the point of overheating. The thermostat then opens and it cools down immediately. We replace the fluids it spit out and then it's fine for the rest of the day. It has to be a bubble of air trapped in the head. We've added all the heater hoses and the heater core seems filled and works very well. I would have thought that by now (several of these cycles) it would have resolved itself but it doesn't seem to be the case. I've read somewhere that removing the temperature sensor should allow for any air trapped in the head to escape. Is that accurate? is there another way to more fully fill the water jackets? Are we missing something?