I have an 88 F150 that I'm wanting to make some changes to and use for some mudding, off road, basically go anywhere truck for hunting. It's not going to be for trails so use it but not abuse it kind of truck. It has 31's, 3.55 gears, no lift, open differentials. What I was thinking was a 3" body lift ( clearance without messing with the TTB axle ), an Ox locker in the rear, an aussie locker in the front, gearing it around 4.56, and 33" tires. I have read on other sites about a solid axle swap but I don't plan on abusing the truck off roading enough to justify the time, expense, and headache of swapping an axle. My question for anyone who wants to give an opinion are as follows. #1, are the tire and gearing reasonable and not overkill for the 44TTB and the 8.8 axles? #2, With the lockers and gearing how well should it do going throught mud, climbing inclines ( mainly hunting and logging type roads ), and pulling power? #3, IS a locker in the front needed or would I be better off leaving it an open and just run the rear locker? Since I'm kinda new at the 4x4 tech stuff I'd appreciate any advice that can be given.  

First of all, for your needs, 4.56 gears and 33's would play very nicely off road but I have issues with your locker selections. The Ox Lockers is a very good locker but your choice for front axle is poor. Aussie Lockers, Lock Right and Detroit's and such all work the same basic way, they are either two wheel drive same speed or one wheel drive with one wheel coasting (faster one) in a turn with no power or very light throttle. They CANNOT power both wheels at different speeds in a turn which is needed in a front axle for good guiding and steering control. Furthermore, Ujoints in front axle are not constant velocity and when you turn sharply not only do you have a different rolling radius between front tires as have axle speed variations caused by Ujoints and with a Aussie locker you would get a lot of steering wheel bind and torque whip at times and reduced turning radius's as well too at times. This type of locker would be my last choice for a front axle. If I had to choose between it and open, I would choose open. I have a couple of suggestions here. You could use a aussie in rear because while it is not my first choice there either it would be better tolerated and use OX up front and lock it as needed. You could also use a True Trax gear based LSD up front. They play really well in front axles and you could get a Aussie for rear and a True Trax for front for less money than your first combo and have a far more livable and flexible combo off road. (you could get a True Trax/Ox locker combo too, F/R). As far as axle strength. Your TTB 44 would live well with 33's for quite some time and in rear, the 8.8 is fairly stout and 33's would be no real challenge for that axle at all even with a locker. BTW your selection of tire size and lack of lift will result in a studier setup as far as withstanding abuse vs a lift with bigger tires yet and it will also give you a lower CG off road too than with a lift.  

Thank you for your response. So far I haven't made up my mind on exctly which locker I will use for either axle, so I can still use useful opinions on that. The OX locker I just found out acts like a spool when locked and since I might find myself needing using full lockup in the rear on the roads we have around here I can see steering problems with it. A locker in the rear such as a lock right and others would probably be a better choice given they rachet around corners. I had thought about a LS in the front and something like a lock right or aussie in the rear. However, if I'm going to use the front axle I don't see much real tight turns where I'd be at, but again I could use more experianced info for that too.  

Those spider gear replacement lockers tend to act like spool when power is applied to to and they are a poor choice for a front axle. Front wheel need to be able to turn different speeds under power and like I said earlier, Ujoints in front axle are not constant velocity and when wheel is turned under power you can get severe torque bind ans steering wheels whip and even broken front axle shafts in extreme cases. The velocity across a bend Ujoint speeds up and slows down twice per rev which also changes torque loading and this 'vibration" can lead to axle failure under right conditions.