two strokes seem tough to some folks but they are great.
throw some stiffer springs in your forks
get a temp gauge so you know where you are at. ideally you want to be between 80f and 150f when the coolant comes out of the head. I believe the te has a nice handy thermostat. I would leave that as is. if I was you, I would drill and tap the head where the bleeder screw is at the top of the head to take coolant flow for your carb heater and temp gauge.
most 2 stroke bikes I ride with don't need engine jackets. in fact they run too hot. the key is knowing how hot you are and adjusting.
if you dont want to jerk around, get a lectron carb. it will come set up perfect for what you are doing. you will also need a carb heater that uses coolant. the electric ones don't work well enough. if your coolant temp drops below 75F there is a real high chance your throttle will freeze and stick wide open. in saying that, get a tether.
you need to build some sort of an intake for the carb. similar to what you see on turbo sleds. keep it as short as possible. you can either remove the center section of your airbox (that year of husky the airbox comes apart pretty nice) or slice up the center of your airbox so the boot goes inside. you want it all open underneith your intake so now snow builds up.
put the red powervalve spring in.
compression helps alot. i have some info on this in another thread. my opinion is that if you increase compression you should run better fuel. others say you dont need to. i run 15/1 and c111 fuel
that will get you pretty close
60:1 is way too lean in my opinion. way higher loads as a snowbike than on dirt. I'm a 32:1 guy