The reason why people give you a hard time is it costs less to build a 308 than a 253, and any money spent on performace upgrades comes for free with a 308! To be brutally honest though, if you want power and economy for a budget price and the car is already a V8 a VN-VP 304 and 4spd auto is the absolute best bang for buck. Just buy a good running engine, and if you are handy you can do most of the work yourself with not a huge expenditure over and above the original purchase expecially if you buy a whole car.