I couldn't agree with you more. A good friend of mine did the swap on his 2011 2SS and his mileage did not change at all. It improved his take-off tremendously.... Dropped his RPM's only a couple hundredrpm is like 1800 at 80mph. You will barlly notice it. Won't affect mileage much at all. Do it. These cars were meant for those gears.
We don't have 1/4 miles local here in Northern Bama, but the same good friend runs a consistent 8.1 in the 1/8 mile. He picked up a couple of tenths from just switching the gears. His only other Mods is exhaust, tune, & ported/polished tb.Have you made a 1/4 mile run yet? Curious if there's much difference.