Thanks for responses,

The car was rebuilt by GGR Racing over 20 years ago and has run like a dream since. It was uprated to 320 hp at that time and GGR have been kind enough to dig out all of the original set up info for me.
The vernier pulleys can really just be centralised to replicate the original pulleys with the arrows such that the centre line of the pulley is related to the keyway on the camshaft which at 180 degrees passes through the centre of the opposite tooth, if you see what i mean! ie the thing sits at 90 and 180 upright and horizontal.
GGR put some marks on the pulleys at the time which are now they say are invalidated by the head skim. They say set it up by the manual.
I take the point about setting up from scratch and Burton have a good description of how to do it. I have the necessary gauges but am probably being lazy in that it involves removing radiator/ intercooler to fit the angle chart on the crankshaft pulley. At the moment, I am trialing a dummy run using an old gasket bolted on to the block with plasicticine to see if there is any valve contact. I am thinking why should it be necessary to do anything other than follow the Ford manual procedure. GGR incidentally dont think there should be any spring resistance at TDC.
Sorry about Conundrum!