@truck-oholic I think I've decided to go this route.. I was looking at the steering and the drag link seems to be an issue with the tie rod (pitman arm puts the drag link in conflict with the tie rod). Now I can't decide on using a bent draglink or a straight... how is your clearance on this? I am also thinking that running a high clearance engine crossmember from ORD wouldnt be a bad idea.
This is a very complicated question. Are you talking about running the exact same setup as me i.e. reverse tie rod and the 1" ballistic spacer or are you not needing the 1" spacer any more? To give you the complete picture you need to know that my axle is moved forward like 2-2.5". I also have a 5.3 motor that is raised 1.25" and adapted with DIY4X's plates and comp motor mounts. That being said, the 1" spacer and the 1.25" drivetrain lift essentially cancel each other out and create a stock-like scenario for clearance given the same forward axle location. If you weren't going to use the 1" spacer you would actually have more room than me if you were running the same engine and axle location.
The 1.25" drivetrain lift was an unanticipated necessary modification in order to run the small block ORD high clearance crossmember. ORD actually recommends you use the big block crossmember when doing an LS swap but that was never communicated to me before purchasing and when I bought it I was considering keeping the factory 400 small block anyway. Even with the big block crossmember, you still might have to do some grinding or spacers for the crossmember to clear the stock 5.3 truck pan.
With regard to tie rod to oil pan clearance, the 5.3 truck pan is sloped toward the sump and then the front bottom corner of the sump is also angled. Even still, I was somewhat concerned about tie rod to oil pan clearance under full bump so I set my bump stops to start making contact at 4" uptravel. I have a new high clearance oil pan that I've armored to put in place of the stock truck pan and that will give me even more room. It has a much smaller sump, about 2" shorter front to back and it's also 2" shorter top to bottom so it will be tucked up nicely.
The drag link has plenty of room. I am running on top of the pitman arm instead of below. The only possible interference that might exist is actually the DIY4X spring plate on the passenger side. Due to the caster shims, leaf pack thickness w/ EZ inch, & tallness of the spring plate, the drag link may wind up rubbing that front edge a little under full passenger stuff and lock but that front edge can easily be trimmed back for clearance.
At this point it should be apparent that my front end setup is pretty much tailor-made for this build so there are a lot of unique factors coming into play. Best I can do for you is give you the info and let you make an educated guess of how it might work on your truck.