I'm giving some consideration to switching my plan from a 302 to a 351.

Here's my question: I know that the 351 limits some options with respect to intakes and air cleaners due to space under the hood. For those who have experience working on both, how noticeable is the difference in underhood room with the 351 when doing maintenance?

I can only see the extra deck height really affecting spark plug changes, touching the exhaust system (something I hope not to have to do much), or pulling the heads (something I hope to NEVER have to do). So I can logic away that it might not be too much, but I've not seen both side by side (and didn't spend as much time looking over the 302 powered Mk4 that I saw at Oshkosh last month). I've also only worked on a very small number of SBF-powered vehicles, and I don't think ever a 351.

I started off my automotive wrenching on Jaguar V12s and we currently have a couple of Mercedes so it's not that I can't deal with tighter underhood setups. It's more that part of my design goal is something simple and easy to work on.

Reason for considering the 351 is for more torque since I've figured that I'm going to have to get a different block anyway, and I can still use my same heads on the 351.

A related question for those who have driven both is how noticeable is the extra weight up front from the 351.