It comes down to what are you into as far as messing with your old truck. 48 BigT is into swapping in new tanks, I'm into the original equipment angle on mine because it's 90% there. I'm into the idea of restoring others are drivers pure and simple.
I replaced the float on my sending unit(from NAPA)but with lots of research and elbow chemicals the mesh screen and all the rest came out nice, clean and ready to go again, plus I learned a bit about how they engineered things.
For the tank I found a 20' chunk of chain and a few shovels of pea gravel worked well, followed by hose off the hot water heater through the pressure washer and finished with an hour of shop vac blowing things dry. YMMV.
It's quicker to replace than restore that's for sure.
