I would defenitly get rubbers ive seen open diff's do better then locked rigs just because they had better tires. and i would personally get an aussie over some of the other things you listed, they are about 259$ shipped.. I would hold off on painting the thing merely because youd be happier with an ugly capable rig rather then a bling bling rig that performs poorly on the trail... if your rig is running good then I would hold off on the carb (not sure on the price) but it seems like you could get your seats and an aussie for the price of the carb. also im not totally sure but I think maybe you could use celica seats, which just means you would have to fabricate some brackets.....
