been thinking about this more and have pretty much decided that the mopar JK Rubicon axles will give the best bang for the buck. I wanted gears deeper than 4.10s, but that's all my 88 has and it gets around just fine. leaning towards the TNT truss (which contains all the necessary control arm/shock/coil mounts) rather than adapting the original stuff or welding on a mutipeice kit.
still not sure which control arms to use. I want to do long arms, though the TNT kit says it doesn't work with Y-link style control arms. this choice might wait 'til I get a firm budget number. going short-arm would be a way to shave a good amount of dough off the bottom line.