A forum for owners of Yamaha TTR250 trail and enduro bikes!

The photos are actually from de-rusting my BSA C15 tank which, to be fair, is nearly 60 years old but the same technique can be applied to an OE or Raid metal tank that might have been left standing empty of fuel for a few years.

The media I used is quite chunky and used in vibrating tumblers and is called, if I recall correctly, "deburring ceramic media" and can be used over and over.

I had hoped to wrap the tank in a duvet and put it in the tumble drier but it didn't have a cold cycle other than a few minutes at the end of a programme so, not wishing to cause an conflagration, I chickened out - also Trish was at home 

I ended up shaking the tank (fairly) vigorously for as long as my unfit arms could stand and then emptied out the media and rust.

I separated out the rust as best I could and had quite a pile although my photo doesn't show too well.

I then washed out the tank thoroughly with a petrol/diesel mix and that brought out a lot more of the fine rust.

Having read horror stories of ethanol-laced fuel dissolving tank sealers, I am going to use the tank unlined as is and do something more drastic when it actually starts to leak 

There is a filter on the tap (similar to the TTR tap) but it is fairly coarse so I am going to run with an inline fuel filter and see how it goes.

Brian