Thank you everyone. I've shipped off to Ford's and am awaiting their assessment. They hope that the barrel can be saved but I have my eye on several listed on ebay or other sellers for when they call me back. If they can't make that bore spotless like it used to be then I'll make a decision.
The neat thing is that there is a 4" hooded barrel from a mod.57 on ebay right now and that would also look interesting. There have been a number of conversions using hooded barrels on this frame that look amazing (see picture).
Unfortunately, selling this and using the funds to purchase a different one is a no-go: except for a short run in 2008 (with that horrid frame-lock) it's been out of production since 1977 and much worse condition guns are commanding serious prices (~$1500).
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