Back in the day (1978) I had a Mercury Zephyr Z7 coupe with a Ford 302 that I tinkered on for quite awhile. Adding headers and duel exhaust, a 4 barrel and decent intake, polishing and porting the heads, changing the spark lead, changing when the secondary's in the 4 barrel kicked in, and many other items too numerous to mention I did manage to get that thing to move right along. So, yes, it can be done. But, are you willing to do the work to do it??? Sure, now- a- days you do all of that by messing with your computer but, it still comes down to how much work you want to do, and if it will do, in the long run, what you want it to do. There is no easy way out. But, if you want to do it you can make some improvements.