Thanks, that's my plan too. dump the ammeter go with a volt meter.
On a side note... I went to the "Cobra Valley" link listed above and found it quite useful especially as it related to thermostats and hotspots and coolant getting super heated in the heads. So far so good.
I called to order a "balanced thermostat" they offer for the FE... I thold the guy what it was for, early style FE, surge tank yadda yadda. They indicate they have these for Ford, Chevy, Mopar ...
What I got was a Mr. Gasket Mopar unit (same diameter as the FE) But... FE's with surge tanks cant use the Mr. Gasket unit because the outlet side is too large to fit into the surge tank.
I know rookie move, FE 101 stuff. The part that irritates me is they display the FE balanced thermostat (which is really a Mopar) next to the correct FE thermostat that will fit and at no point do they suggest you will be getting a Mopar thermostat. (the one you already know won't fit).
So lesson learned. Just because a site caters to specialty cars don't assume they know what they are doing even if they act like they do.
http://performanceunlimited.com/cobr...hermostat.html