I picked up a 2005 YZ250F 2 weeks ago. It doesn't like to start or idle, and the head pipe glows cherry red.
I took the carb apart and cleaned out the goo.
Now I need to clean out the fuel tank. I was thinking about adding new gas, dumping in a bottle of carb cleaner and shaking it up and dumping it out a few times.
Does anyone have a better solution????
Thanks, Bill

about the pipe .
the mx 450 and 250 glow cherry red if left to idle for more than a minute or so . its normal

I would think just rinsing the tank out with gas maybe shaking it around a bit would clean it out , maybe only be careful of some things you put in it because some chemicals discolor plastic tanks.

chances are the short amount of time you would have the carb cleaner in the tank it would not cause any problems , but I thought you may want to be warned .
good luck

Thank you for the info on the head pipe, that was driving me crazy!!
I have never owned a Yamaha before so I'm starting from scratch trying to learn all of the little idiosyncrasies.

i would take of the valve thing off the tank(forgot the name) and run hot water threw it for a minute. make sure it is completly dry before you use it. ive never cleaned a tank before but thats my guess.

Dump the old gas into a container and take it to a service station for collection. Unless there's a lot of debris in it, you should be fine to just start by putting a half gallon or so in until it's running fine. Instead of carb cleaner, I'd recommend going to your parts store and buying a can or two of SeaFoam (http://www.seafoamsales.com/motor-treatment/index.html) to mix in with your gas. You don't need much when mixing it. It's a great cleaner and fuel stabilizer.

SeaFoam it is !!!!!
Thank you

yes, just make sure you dont put too much of it in