Larry,
I was never trying to discount or debate you on this topic, just that I have searched a couple times on this casting number and there are so many hits for people with this low deck vs. high deck discrepancy on this particular 3788378 that it seems to be one of the common casting numbers that doesn't make sense.
I have a '72 parts catalog for pickups, but it does show car castings in it. I can't find that casting under 153s, 194/216/230/235/261, 250 or 292. The casting doesn't exist in the catalog.
NOTE: The Chevy Nova II shows this casting quite a bit, and the head on the engines seems to be for a 194.
OP, what are your other casting numbers for your head, serial number, etc...? There are a couple letters after the serial that show where the engine was manufactured, or at least should be. Should be on the VIN plate.
I'll go with Twisted6 on numbers.
You're more than welcome to do that. As a single person none of us can retain all of this information, and the fact that so many discrepancies exist would suggest GM ain't perfect, which most of us already knew.
As a collective we can figure things out that no single person can. In fact without anyone before us we probably wouldn't have the resource of information we do today.
