Ok in preparation for stator reinstall I pulled the head. Easier than I thought. Any general feedback? Gasket looks okay to me.  Left side seals in and tire back together.  More waiting. Bought a dial indicator from dennis kirk so I can do this properly. I hope I'm learning!

Ok in preparation for stator reinstall I pulled the head. Easier than I thought. Any general feedback? Gasket looks okay to me.  Left side seals in and tire back together.  More waiting. Bought a dial indicator from dennis kirk so I can do this properly. I hope I'm learning!

  

Looks fine but can’t tell too much unless you push the piston down and look for scoring or other wear. You can reuse that copper head gasket, just anneal it with a propane torch or stove.

The carbon out the head makes me wonder. 

Only saw it on my phone before so didn't see much. Looking at it on a computer now. Seems like hardly any carbon at all in the combustion chamber, yet like you said, way too much outside. Could be the original gasket wasn't annealed and they just installed it, that's not unheard of. Could also be it was leaking, the PO got lazy, cleaned the carbon in the combustion chamber, put in a new head gasket and didn't run it long enough to build up carbon. Personally I'd clean it well, anneal the current gasket, torque to spec and try again keeping a close eye on it.

I would super clean the head and check to see if it’s warped then use a new gasket and torque it to spec ride it  then let it cool off and retorque do this a couple of times to seat the gasket 

I was told to do that when I worked at butlers yamaha in the 70s

Can't anneal 250 head gaskets as are copper with composite sandwich in the middle so be careful. If someones found a solid copper replacement then ok, you can. 360's had the solid copper one.

I just ordered a new one.

Not sure others do, I use Copper Coat on head gaskets. Works well for me. 

I have a dial gauge and practiced using it today.  Ordered the proper rings and bottom gasket.  Why are there two rings and two wire looking things? 
I have a dial gauge and practiced using it today.  Ordered the proper rings and bottom gasket.  Why are there two rings and two wire looking things?