Unless you're planning on running boost, nitrous or stupid high compression forged internals are a great cost for no benefit. In fact, you'll likely see less longevity. 408, well many kits are forged but you can also get them without forging. In the end, quite a bit overkill.
Front and rear axle assemblies and something better: do you have a 1500 2500 or 3500? What do you consider better? if you're simply looking for stronger and you have a 1500, D60s out of a 2500 are mostly plug and play and they're stronger. 2500 or 3500 truck, waste of time to find something stronger for a 360 unless you're wanting 44+" tires.
Headers and exhaust: pacesetter longtubes. Don't waste your time on shorties for a healthy upgraded 360. They have tiny 1.5" primary pipes, crap factory 2" ball collectors and crap factory ypipe. Pacesetter longtubes are a 1-3/4" primary that is much more appropriate for a 360 cube or bigger motor, especially an upgraded one. Dual 2.5" will provide plenty of power though with those longtubes you could do dual 3" if you wanted and not see a decrease in performance. At that point you're looking at cost, sound and weight.
Gearing: depends on tire size and what you're wanting out of the truck. Me for example, I run 4.56s. Currently I'm running 315/70/17s which are about a 34.4x12.4 tire. I LOVE it though I'll be going back down to 285/70/17s soon. The 315s have great drivability, like a new truck. the 285s though are fun as hell to drive, have a bit higher rpm and I actually get better mileage. That and they're still in my storage unit. The gears I run are even still appropriate for a 37" tire OR a hot street build on a 30-31" tire.
BTW, skip hughes tuning. Comes from a company called Performance Injection Equipment and they have a quite expansive history of killing engines with their tuning. Much better options out there (not hemifever either)
