Paul,
Sorry if you don't like it when someone disagrees,
but your statement that milling the block is "only worth doing when you are eking out the last horsepower " is just plain wrong. Anyone who wants to take the time to Google "squish area" and the affects of reducing the squish distance on improving combustion efficiency and reducing the chances of detonation/pinging will see that.

Further, I did not say that I would recommend milling .007 off the block for budget rebuilds. I said that we routinely did it at one time before realizing that there were larger deck height variations than I originally thought. So we now measure the deck height even on our "budget" engines. We also mill blocks to make sure they are flat and will give a good gasket seal as well as to make sure that the block surface is parallel to the the crank, which it often is not.

No I would not recommend that everyone doing a budget rebuild go to the trouble of milling the block just to take .007 off. But assuming the block is already apart and at a machine shop, sitting near the milling machine, it makes sense to check the deck height and if its way off - such as .030 - to have it corrected as it will be a very minor portion of the cost of any rebuild. They also have to remember that the original head gasket that was .028 thick crushed is no longer available and has turned into a .034 gasket, so we are already .006 off original specs.

400 miles from the 15.8 gallon tank in a 142 comes out to only 25.3 mpg.
Assuming that we are talking about mostly highway miles, our engines routinely do much better than that, whether with SUs, Mikunis, or even with our supercharger, and not on flat roads. 28 mpg would be normal for trips on our hilly highways in the northeast US (such as rt 81 through NY, PA and VA for anyone familiar with the area ) with higher numbers for 70 + mph cruising on flatter highways. Our customers are usually surprised that they can have more power, go much faster, and still get better fuel mileage.

John
V-performance.com