304 is fun in them. For wheeling, try to stay away from the 3 speed, no crawl ratio. Some of the 70s models came with a heavy 4 speed, forget what it was, maybe T18, has the low gear. 80+ will all have the d300 case and a better gear ratio. 80-81 could come with an SR4 transmission, it is junk, most have been swapped out by now. The t4 and t5 are OK. T176 is good/strong but the ratio is not as good, still probably better off with it though. All the automatics were good, beware the one that came with quadratrac as quadratrac is junk.

Late 70s started to come with disc brakes which are nice, as well as power brakes. Not sure when steering went power.

You can still buy good ones for $6000 I think, will take a little searching.