Okie Dude,
Firstly I must remark on the choice of the hood on your '80.That is my favorite Vette hood.It reminds me of my miss spent youth when I callously drove the Vettes of that year.Great look.
I have a '80 California Vette which means it had a Q-Jet which was governed by the computer by two solenoids on the carb along with an O2 sensor.
After being in Fl. for a year the carb which operated like a champ in CA. started to take a dump here and I changed it to an Edelbrock 750 electric choke, has a fuel pressure gage which never exceeds 5lbs cold and operated at 2.5-3 psi warmed, with a stock OEM fuel pump.
I am still on the stock intake manifold, albeit I have a spacer converting from spread bore to a square bore,which made me change my mind about buying a hood like yours to accomadate the carb and spacer,however did not have the problem of space due to using the air cleaner I had, and had Spectre Corp make a 1.99 in X 12 in. K/N type air filter.
All and all everything works perfectly. I have better low end (off the line) torque than the Q-Jet,however I can foresee a top end problem after 140 MPH because of smaller secondaries in the Edelbrock than the Qjet,albeit my days of running that fast are numbered along with no place to run that fast here in Florida,unlike Interstate 5 in CA.
Good Luck on the transition from Q-Jet to Edelbrock.I must also suggest you have the brand new out of the box carb be checked thoroughly as the advertisement erroneous states "put it on right out the box",is not true.I have had brand new carbs "right out the box" air/fuel mixture screws almost closed off instead of 2.5 turns out(stock setting from Edelbrock)