I picked up a '73 Scout a couple weeks ago. It's pretty rough but it ran, the price was right, and I figure I can fix pretty much anything that's wrong with it anyway so I pulled the trigger on my next project. Here's a picture of it enroute back to my place:

It has a 258 with a T18 and a D20 and manual everything. With a little bit of work I got it through emissions so now it's time to start fixing everything else that's wrong with it and turn it into something I can enjoy offroad.
This might turn into a build thread, but I'm looking for some opinions as well. For the time being I'd like to put some 31's on it and just enjoy cruising some dirt roads but the end goal will be to have it SOA on 35's or 37's and run some hard trails with it. I have 2 options I'm looking at for doing this and wondering what you guys think might be the better bet.
Option 1: Do the SOA on D44's, the front will be a Waggy D44 so hopefuly I won't have to cut and turn the knuckles. Build the axles with chromo shafts, lockers, blah blah, twin stick the D20, maybe throw a Teralow in it and have fun.
Option 2: Do the SOA on a built Ford D60 and 14 bolt I already have, adapt the T18 to an NP231 so I'm driver drop, probably do a ton more fab than I need to to get the springs in the correct place, probably stretch the rear a bit while I'm there, you get the idea.
I gues the question is, do a relatively easy build with axles that were madeish for the rig and live with smaller axles and a t-case I probably won't love, or do a bunch of work for a bullet proof drivetrain that I'll never have to worry about. There's a possibility I'll just start with option 1 but hold onto my 1 tons and build option 2 in the future but was curious if you guys think it will be worth it to just jump to option 2 right off the bat, or if option 1 will serve me well enough on 35's.

It has a 258 with a T18 and a D20 and manual everything. With a little bit of work I got it through emissions so now it's time to start fixing everything else that's wrong with it and turn it into something I can enjoy offroad.
This might turn into a build thread, but I'm looking for some opinions as well. For the time being I'd like to put some 31's on it and just enjoy cruising some dirt roads but the end goal will be to have it SOA on 35's or 37's and run some hard trails with it. I have 2 options I'm looking at for doing this and wondering what you guys think might be the better bet.
Option 1: Do the SOA on D44's, the front will be a Waggy D44 so hopefuly I won't have to cut and turn the knuckles. Build the axles with chromo shafts, lockers, blah blah, twin stick the D20, maybe throw a Teralow in it and have fun.
Option 2: Do the SOA on a built Ford D60 and 14 bolt I already have, adapt the T18 to an NP231 so I'm driver drop, probably do a ton more fab than I need to to get the springs in the correct place, probably stretch the rear a bit while I'm there, you get the idea.
I gues the question is, do a relatively easy build with axles that were madeish for the rig and live with smaller axles and a t-case I probably won't love, or do a bunch of work for a bullet proof drivetrain that I'll never have to worry about. There's a possibility I'll just start with option 1 but hold onto my 1 tons and build option 2 in the future but was curious if you guys think it will be worth it to just jump to option 2 right off the bat, or if option 1 will serve me well enough on 35's.