It would help a lot if you put the original-style air cleaner back on and got rid of the two-chrome-pie-plates nonsense.
I don't know why you would say that. If the carb is not electronic there is no need for a restrictive air housing. If the truck will be subjected to deep water crossings then i might advocate for something to protect the air cleaner from splash but from what I know about carbs and engines they can use all the air they can get. Heated air from under the hood of an old Chevy is a moot point, the power loss is so small as to be unnoticeable. The six inch tall K&N filter with the pie plate housing or maybe the filter upper housing works just fine. Besides, that little bit of chrome looks good too. The factory style housing wasn't for smog related activities anyway, it was for making the engine quiet. A carb makes a lot of noise when it works at anything outside of an idle, the restrictions in the air box where to dampen those sound waves. The shutter was to help the choke and send preheated air to the carb to help prevent icing during start-up. Both non-issues with a well tuned carb (meaning one that is tuned to work, not one that is tuned for maximum miles-per-gallon, in other words, the lean-burn system that the mid-eighties engines where subject to having).
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