Bend0matic

Just doing some research into what other people use for cleaning their bikes and looking for tips and tricks. Here is what I use.

Tools:

• Pedro’s brush kit
• 5 Gallon Lowe’s Bucket
• Garden Hose on low/mist
• Shop rags and towels
• Park CM-5 Chain Cleaner Tool

Supplies:

• Whatever dish soap I happen to have around
• Park CB-4 Bio Chainbrite cleaner
• WD-40 Bike Degreaser

Anyone use a bike specific cleaner or one of those foaming cleaners? If so, does it make the job easier, clean better, etc? What about using a pressure washer, turned down or in mist mode? I’ve even seen bike specific pressure washers but I don’t see any reason to buy yet another thing to take up space where another bike could go.

Iride01 

Those premoistened cleaning towels that come in those plastic bottles and you pull them out the top.

That's all a road bike needs, IMO. Or at least that is all mine needs.

In fact it's been a while, I think I'll go clean mine right now. I just rode it a few hours ago and was noticing how filthy it was while I was riding. Sweat and drink mix spatters all over the down tube and top tube. Little bit of gunk from my chain on the stay.

Just nasty looking. I should be embarrassed...... but I'm not.


edit:

Just finished. I'll have to add a few things. Some alcohol and paper towel to use on brake rotors when finished. Just in case my cleaning towelette had too much grease or chain oil on it while trying to clean the stays or forks near the disc. And a clean ever so slightly damp cotton rag to go over everything to remove the film the premoistened towelettes sometimes leave.

aggiegrads

I usually use shop rags to do a wipe down, with soapy water where I need more help. Disposable rag with OMS to wipe the chain.

I like a clean bike, but I don't go overboard with waxes or bike-specific cleaners.

deacon mark

I make it easy. I use any dish soap on hand but usually have simple green. Many times I just hang the bike in basement and spray bottle the frame and places that are dirty. That avoids getting any water around the handlebars and brifters. Usually it the underneath of the BB area that gets dirty and rear rim brake. Wheels of course and sometimes I just hose it down with water and dish soap. Then I take of the chain I have a wipperman quick link, and clean it in OMS and go all around the cranks and the rear derailleur with OMS. Cassette I just use a brush I bought at menards run it around till clean. Normally my bike is not ridden in bad weather and it is a road bike so no trails and messy mud.,

Once a year I might take off the brakes and soak them in detergent and put them back on, I would do this if I have to re-cable the bike or I just am bored and want a clean bike. The big thing is I keep the chain clean although I not obsessed about it and I get huge miles on chains. Normally an 11 speed chain easily last me 6000-7000 miles no real stretching. I wipe it quick with OMS and then lube it with the basic dirt cheap hardware store oil for small engines. Given I don't ride in the rain in purpose probably has much to do with it. Sometimes I spray a little wd-40 on the front and rear brakes around the springs and pivots. This helps with clean and provides some lube although not really needed.

Basically it is a bike and not complicate. I avoid all the trappings of LBS products for cleaning they can all be found elsewhere far cheaper. Even lubing a bike is way over thought. Clearly you need to grease and carbon paste for places and such but it is just a bike. Since I repair guitars for a living I can tell you a guitar is a 1000 times harder to work on and requires zillions of tools. I use my guitar tools at times to work on bikes even. Also bikes are consumables they will wear out or at least many of the parts. Guitars wear too for sure but nothing like a bike in terms of replacing major parts. I might in the dead of winter this year sort of take my Titanium Habby and give it the complete over the top. Remove everything and clean and re-install. I sometimes think about doing this every winter but then the real world hits me.................if it is not broke don't fix it. It sure is not going to rust.

SurferRosa

Start with fully overhauled bike. Add wd-40 and paper towels.

billridesbikes

On any painted bike I never use dish soap. Dish soap is actually isn’t a soap, it’s a detergent that has a very high PH. And it does a good job removing old wax or gunk on brake pads, but bike paint is pretty fragile and dish soap will scratch up the paint and eventually ruin the finish if used repeatedly.

Think about how well your dish soap cleans stuff off your pots and pans, now imagine it working on your clear coat or paint job. Plus if you don’t do a good enough rinse job and get every bit of the detergent off it will continue to eat away at the surface.

Instead use a cleaner that is formulated for painted surfaces like an automotive soap with a pH of 7. (I.e. neutral)

pdlamb

Huh. Here I was thinking all the scratches on my bike -- you know the ones on the outside of the fork, or the top tube, or the chainstays -- were caused by leaning the bike up against a wall, or a post, or a tree. Sometimes the bike rolls a few inches, sometimes (horrors!) it falls down, scratching all the way. I never knew it was the dish soap!

scott967

I mix car wash soap and water in a hand squirt bottle used for watering plants. That and an old t-shirt. Maybe some solvent like bug remover or OMS if I went over a patch of asphalt or tar that gets on the downtube. I wax my chain so don't have to clean the drivetrain. Exception is with rain, then I use a hose and brush with my car wash bucket to get the major stuff off.

scott s.
.

billridesbikes

Happy to elucidate this for you! LOL

Russ Roth

Some of us really like our paint jobs and are very particular about this.

Just basic maintenance cleaning; pull off the wheels for truing grab a bottle of windex a clean used red rag (never use a new red rag for leaning near a white bike) and spray down the frame and wipe it off, spray the wheels while spinning and wipe them off. Cleans as good as anything out there, cuts through greasy areas and is cheap to buy. If you want it to look shiny after hit it with some pledge wood polish, don't do the rims though, and done.

Now if a bike is really muddy and crusty, then I hit the car wash, the wash setting will happily hose through everything, just don't squeeze the trigger and really blast the bike though blasting the tires on a mtb will get them uncaked and if you have a white seat that's looking dingy pulling the trigger on it can also get it looking new. I typically leave it on the rear rack for this treatment and its dry by home. I know people are going to **** over this idea but I maintain my own bikes and have been a bike tech for decades and have never had this been a problem or a worry, just don't blast directly into the bearings and its never an issue, run Chris Kings and its really never an issue.

cxwrench

Between the shop and whichever team I was working for I have it down to a few minutes and some simple tools. If I'm washing 10-15 bikes every day...at the end of the day...it doesn't take long.

2 x 2.5 or 5 gal buckets
2 x cheap car wash sponges, one for wheels/frames, one for drivetrain
1 x cheap toilet brush
microfibre towels
sprayer attachment w/ multiple settings (I never use 'mist', always a setting w/ more power)
some type of chain rest that the chain can sit on so I can spin the cranks w/ the wheels out (I have a custom Abbey w/ a Zipp Ti skewer)
usually Dawn blue dish soap and Pedro's degreaser (the thick yellow/orange stuff...best ever)

Put the bike in a beam stand, wheels off, chain on chain rest. Hit it w/ the hose. Put the degreaser on the cassette/chain/rings. I put it in a cut down water bottle and use a 1" paint/bbq brush. I put the bottle in the seat tube cage while I'm applying, then on a cage mounted to my stand. Wash the bike excepting the drivetrain w/ the 'clean' sponge. I do everything...saddles, tape, shifter hoods, top/sides/bottom. Start at the top, work your way down. Grab the 'cog' brush and scrub the pulleys, rings. Soak the 'dirty' sponge and wrap it around the chain. It should come out spotless unless you're using some evil wax **** on the chain. Give it a rinse, and dry. Lube chain. Wash wheels after scrubbing cogs. Usually takes me about 5mins max per bike, I do all the wheels at once.
I find that people are usually unnecessarily dainty/careful when washing. You kinda have to try to ruin stuff. People always say 'pro mechanics can wash however they want, they have tons of free replacement parts'. True, but we don't want to work any more than we have to, so that myth is just that, a myth. I could wash bikes w/ a pressure washer and not wear anything out quicker than if I did it dry w/ Kleenex.