While it's always been a fine engine in and of itself, by far the small-block's strongest suit has always been the vast number of applications it has seen. Lots of applications means lots of factory performance parts to chose from, even if you've got something as garden-variety as a 305.
The 350-cubic-inch L98 found itself in the engine bays of both tuned-port-injected Camaros and Corvettes; Corvettes engines got aluminum cylinder heads with 58 cc combustion chambers, and Camaros got iron heads with 64 cc chambers. It's well-known that some 350 heads won't work with 305 engines, because the 305's 0.33-inch smaller bore can interfere with the valve heads. However, that's only likely to happen with larger 2.02-inch intake valves. The L98's 1.95-inch valves, the position of those valves and the shape of the chamber make these heads fine for use on a 305. The L98 head, with it's high-velocity, D-shaped ports will help to maintain throttle response when used on the smaller 305 engine, and the ports' 163 cc sizing still makes them viable high-rpm horsepower units. Just make sure you account for the change in combustion chamber size, since going with the 64 cc iron heads will cost you about 0.7-point of compression.
