Stev8del8

Do you, Got, even work on your bicycle?

jemdet

Performance aside, Phil grease smells fantastic

Camilo

Oh, I think any thread where both steel and carbon fiber are mentioned produces equal or more contentious and redundant threads. 😎

3alarmer 

...if you don't ride your bikes, you don't need to grease them. Just a thought.

Kimmo 

I could easily be wrong, but I was under the impression WD40 contains an emulsifier, allowing any water to mix with the oily WD40, thus diluting it away, and when the volatiles evaporate there's a small amount of slightly heavier stuff left behind.

The emulsifier is mainly why it's meant to be a crap chain lube, aside from the fact it's way too light.

Kimmo 

Yes and no...

There are some applications where you need something specific, like in roller brake hubs, or maybe you need anti-seizing properties for say Ti on Ti. And don't forget carbon paste.

And obviously you need to use a type of grease that's formulated to be somewhat weatherproof, like boat trailer grease. But yeah, 99% of the time that's all you need.

OTOH, if you want to get nerdy about it, there are of course marginal improvements to be had, like optimal viscosity or lack of colour to avoid staining and better reveal contamination, and so on.

BTW, I remember a colleague telling me how MTB guys would lube their tubes with talc to make their tyres more supple, and how he reacted favourably when I suggested graphite. There are are lots of different kinds of friction happening on a bike that you might want to address as successfully as possible, so to that end, specialised lubes for each purpose are going to help.

Rowan

He might if he ever uses the word again. Or... are you only seeing what you want to see?

The real difference between boat trailer grease (or any axle grease) and specific bike grease is that the carrier in the latter is lighter, so the frictional forces are less for the racers. Little and light is the key.

Of course, who has to keep a tub or tube of grease lying around these days? Cartridge bearings that are just thrown away at service time have done away with all that slippery stuff.

(Word: I've acquired a set of seal picks and now look at each sealed bearing with the intent of cleaning and relubing. So yes, I have tubes of bike grease lying around...)

Stev8del8

I'm using cup and cone hubs when I can. I still have a stash of silver Campy hubs. I've found that a square taper, cup and cone bottom bracket is still possible with 10 speed chain rings. Moving to an 11 speed crank requires a cartridge bearing bottom bracket. I suppose, one could mill the crank spider.


I still need tub grease for the headset bearings and overall assembly. Never-seez for crank tapers and pedals.


All assembled with love.

3alarmer 

...by god, now you've done it. Minimum of 15 more pages on why crank tapers should be dry or greased. I hope you're satisfied, young man.

Stev8del8

Branford Bike is selling Kluber Isoflex NB52 (Campagnolo Bicycle Grease) in a 75 gram tub. Listed under the "Le Tour" brand.


Just so you know.

Reynolds 

Greased, of course!

gfk_velo

Theres a lot of folk here who dont appear to know much about oils, greases and the interactions between the oil the soap, other thickeners and the assemblis that theyre used in. Its a whole complex science of its own (obviously, a significant part of the petrochemical industry is built on it)

Campagnolo use Kluber NB52 Isofex Topas as their general lubrication grease, it's a barium soap material with a synthetic oil base. The synthetic oil used as a base wont attack the resins that Campagnolo use in their composite materials, nor impregnate and soften some of the plastics they use, as do some volatile mineral based oils used in things like WD40..

They use DuPont Molykote for high stress applications like top and bottom pivot bolt assemblies in some derailleurs. Molykote is, as the name suggests, a Molybdonum soap grease, very persistent, resistant to high shear loads and with extremely slow environmental degradation.

Mobil XHP222 is used, specifically, in the Ekar rear derailleur lower pivot as the combination of viscosity and environmental resistance it has made it well suited to the heavily sprung but also, heavily worked, assembly in that application.

Generally, in bicycles, the main function of the grease is to keep water from the bearing surfaces and to retain the oil component against them
It's not, as you might have in other applications, so much concerned with conducting heat, for instance (although, on a micro scale, it can and does get heated by compression) ...

Some companies use general purpose greases in their assemblies and many buy a generic product, repackage it and sell it as "bicycle specific" but a few of the companies out there are more careful in what they use and specify with great care ... Campagnolo is one of them -there are of course, others. Chris King are famous, for instance, for their insistence on a particular formulation of grease that was subsequently banned under both US and EU environmental law.

Thanks, folks, for all of your help.

RGMN

Quality post as usual Graeme.

Do you know which Molykote Campagnolo is using? There's a quite a few listed on Dupont's website.

gfk_velo

I believe it's G-1057.
I'd need to check now with Engineering ... we have it in plain unlabelled tubs supplied to us some years ago when we took over as the SC in the UK.
Suffice to say, we had 3 x 200ml containers supplied to us and we've only used one so far, so the material supplied should keep us going for about another 25 years :-D

They also use, in similar applications and in the pawl spring / drive ring area of the hubs, Kluber Polylub Gly 501 which has broadly similar properties.

roth rothar

I thought that Campagnolo owners used only freshly squeezed pepperoni grease on their bikes .

jnbrown

I just finished a tube of Phil grease and I have it had it way more than 10 years.
I hate the smell and so does my wife, so I got a tube of Super Lube and I am super happy with it so far.
All my bikes have sealed bearings so I only use it on bolts and things.

bikemig 

This is one of the better zombie threads I've seen come back to life mainly because of post 87.

gfk_velo

Yeah, apologies for that, one of my colleagues on FB pointed me at it.
Some of my colleagues have an odd sense of humour :-D

easyupbug 

While heretofore I did not think much of boutique greases, we landed a frame we needed that was horribly stored back east in the open for 15 years with one of the new 2008 record shifters hanging upside down so that dirt and moisture (mud) filled the underside cavities. With all of that at the overhaul I was shocked at the very good condition of the Campagnolo grease in the shifter internals.

sincos

I always thought Campy grease was very nice and of course it came in that cool, classy tub, but I thought grease was grease and it was, well, grease, that they slapped an eye-watering markup on for Campyphiles. Then I looked up Kluber NB52 and ... yeah, not so much of a markup. NB52 also seems to be held in uniformly high regard, though maybe overkill for bike purposes. I didn't realize that there was so much to grease. I learned something today, so thank you gfk_velo. (Though I still think ordinary white grease or green goop is perfectly adequate if you're regular about maintenance).

gfk_velo

I'll post our general mechanics training course notes on grease here when they are completed - just working now to bring them up to date.
"All you wanted to know about oils and greases but were afraid to ask" ...

NB52 is exceedingly persistent which is why Campagnolo use it. The ErgoPower levers, particularly, unless really hideously abused, will retain their original lubrication for a decade or more.
That's why Campagnolo don't suggest the "Shimano fix" of flushing through with LPS1 or other such volatile oils. It's just not necessary. TBF, Shimano don't recommend it either but the problem of the grease that they use "drying out" after a while is acknowledged by most mechanics and the fix is likewise widely applied :-D

easyupbug 

I can now add to the above that I pulled the 15 year old unmoved jockey wheels from the RD and again the grease appeared in amazing condition, it must have something in the thickener to prevent the oil from drying/draining out.

gfk_velo

As promised, here's the text from our primer on oils and greases. Please use as you wish but any reproduction should carry the Copyright note.Lubricants and Greases

Lubrication oils

Lubrication oils are generally used in bicycles, in areas where regular cleaning and replacement is possible and where the main purpose is to facilitate the movement of one surface at low friction, over another. Lubricant oils are also used in areas away from the finished bicycle itself which, with various degrees of frequency, may be carried out in the bicycle workshop. These include jobs like thread cutting, milling and turning in steel, aluminium alloys and plastics, including composites.

Oils have some basic characteristics and in some cases utilise additives to increase their suitability to the roles assigned to them.

Lubricant oils are also the basis for greases, so it follows that attention should be paid to the recommendations made for those components that interface closely with other parts that use grease lubrication. If a rear hub, say, specifies the use of a synthetic oil-based grease, then a mineral oil based chain lubricant may not be the best choice.

Some lubricant oils may come in aerosol form. The propellant that drives the oil from the can should also be considered. Some propellants can degrade the materials used in the areas that the oil is being applied to, so attention needs to be paid to what the propellant is and what effect it might have. If in doubt, aerosol oils can be applied to a cloth and applied from there.

Below are some quite generalised notes about the three principal types of oil used. Different industry players will formulate, mix andcompound these materials to suit their purposes but bear in mind that the basic constituents are generally the same – consistency and viscosity and the additives that are then used to give other specific characteristics notwithstanding, some of the basic characteristics may remain highly relevant in the particular application – hence when a component maker suggests that a synthetic oil is chosen, it may be because some specific property or material within the component that is being lubricated might be damaged by other materials.

Mineral oils

This family of oils are perhaps the amongst the most common in use, in mechanical settings.

Mineral oils are produced from naturally-occurring crude oil and the fractionation and dewaxing of that material, to produce oils of differing characteristics.

Fractionation is an industrial process whereby crude oil is broken into “fractions” of varying molecule sizes – very broadly speaking, the “lightest” oils with the smallest molecule sizes tend to be those that are used in pure lubrication applications. Wax molecules are removed from these fractions, usually by chemical / catalytic means, to produce oils that have very good lubricity, are quite resistant to oxidation and which have good viscosity and pourability qualities.

Additives are then frequently incorporated to instil specific enhancement of the natural properties of the oil, or to stabilise the oil in use – so temperature stability, shear strength, anti-oxidation and corrosion protection for the surfaces that the oil is applied to are all things that mineral oils might have additives included to enhance.

Synthetic oils

Synthetic oils are what their name suggests – oils that have been created in as the result of a chemical process that doesn’t necessarily occur in the natural environment.

Some components in synthetic lubricants can be manufactured using chemically modified petroleum components rather than from naturally-occurring crude oil but can also be synthesized from other raw materials. The base material, however, is still mainly distilled or fractionated crude oil that is chemically or physically modified. The additives and processes used are generally proprietary and the information as to how these processes are carried out is commercially sensitive and so, broadly, unpublished – but it clearly varies amongst producers – the same being true of any additives that are incorporated.

The most important characteristics from a bicycle industry standpoint is that because synthesising oils can produce very uniform molecular size, the lubricant property is enhanced – put simply, surfaces will slide better over one another with less energy loss.

Many synthetics are also manufactured to be less of a problem where plastics, including composite materials, are exposed to them, causing less chemical degradation of the plastic.

Vegetable oils

Probably the oldest oils known and probably also the first to be used to reduce friction, either in their own right, from pressed nut or seed sources, or as components of animal fats. In recent years they have gained some popularity as an alternative to mineral and synthetic oils because of their perceived “green” characteristics and the fact that they will naturally degrade in the environment and, like pure mineral oils, have very low rates of toxicity. Reduced reliance on the import of crude oil has also been a driver, historically, in advances made in vegetable oils for industrial applications.

Vegetable oils have some strong plus points, insofar as, when compared to mineral oils, they can have a very high inherent lubricity – in other words, they provide the same freedom of movement in a system for less energy input. This has obvious benefits in the bicycle industry.

On the downside, they are also poorly adapted to resisting oxidation, so thicken and “clump” over extended periods in use, unless very specific additives are considered to prevent this. Those additives may and may not be as bio-degradable or non-toxic as the basic oil, so reducing the environmental benefits of the use of vegetable oils whilst increasing their cost.

Greases

Greases and other viscous lubricants have traditionally been used to keep components lubricated and isolated from potentially damaging materials (water, other chemical agents, materials that may interact unfavourably). However, no two lubricants are the same - different types of material produce different results based on their specific properties.

Lubricants have many different applications and are used across a wide range of applications. In bicycles, we are mainly interested in the lubrication and protection from corrosion of bearings, the protection from corrosion of interfaces (the meeting of two metal surfaces, for instance) and the protection of exposed metal surfaces that might otherwise be subject to environmental corrosion.

Below is a generalised summary of some of the most common lubricants available on the market today. The notes are a consolidation of the information that can be found from OE manufacturers of lubricant products, such as Castrol, Kluber, Mobil, Shell and Valvoline - and therefore should be free of the more extravagant claims of some “industry-specific” suppliers, who in most cases will be buying and re-packaging an existing product from a specialist manufacturer.

Composition of a grease

Greases are manufactured products and may have two or more components. Basically, they are an oil and a thickening agent, usually a metallic soap. Other additives may be included to achieve specific aims.

Base oil

Base oil is the foundation of every lubricant product. The type of base oil used determines the overall performance of that lubricant product. The viscosity of the base oil and it’s stability in terms of temperature, pressure and resistance to being “worked” are all factors. Three main types of base oils are mineral, synthetic, and vegetable oils. Synthetic oils are widely considered to offer the best results in terms of protection, performance, temperature and weather resistance, followed by good shear stability.

Thickener

The thickener is the best-known component of a grease, in that greases are often described by the (usually metallic) component of the thickener – Lithium, Sodium, Barium etc. The thickener is a chemical soap and is used to enable the grease components to bond better, increasing the overall efficiency of the grease. Types of thickeners that are commonly may be either simple or complex soaps. In addition, certain non-soap thickeners, such as those based on clay and polyurea, can be used to give the grease its desired characteristics.

Additives

Additives may be used to enhance the basic qualities of a grease in order to increase its suitability to a purpose. These can be additives to resist or improve performance in terms of extreme pressure, for instance, or be oxidation, rust, and corrosion inhibitors, polymers used to increase adhesiveness, insoluble solids, and additives that provide increased wear and tear protection. Also, dyes and pigments are often added to a grease for reasons of identification or marketing.

Some common types of grease and their uses

Calcium grease

Calcium grease is one of the first greases that was manufactured for general use. The key features of calcium greases are good water resistance and good corrosion protection. Calcium greases also have great mechanical stability. These greases are best used at lower temperatures – the structure of the grease is adversely affected high temperatures. Calcium greases are not widely used in bicycles but if used in a role they are suited to are not a bad choice. The desire for a one-size-fits-all material has led most industry players to seek alternatives though. Outside of bicycles, calcium grease and calcium complex grease find wide application in marine, industrial, automotive, and agricultural situations.

Lithium grease

In cycling, lithium grease has become something of a by-word. Lithium greases are multipurpose materials best known for their durability, high viscosity, and stability. They can provide long-lasting protection against oxidation, corrosion and wear and tear. Although it’s not generally relevant in bicycle applications, they have good high temperature stability. Lithium and lithium complex greases are widely used because of their excellent lubrication, good water resistance, and the ability to withstand high pressure and shock loads. They have a key application in demanding metal-to-metal situations as a barrier to galvanic corrosion. Outside of the cycle industry they are to be found in wide use in both industrial and household applications.

Barium complex grease

Barium complex greases are a very high-performance family of grease products, widely known for their mechanical stability, high-temperature resistance, ability to withstand heavy loads and high speeds, excellent water tolerance, great oxidation stability, as well as resistance to various chemicals. Generally, barium complex grease is mostly used in demanding, heavy-load applications. It is very well suited in bicycles to hubs and bottom brackets where comparatively small bearings have relatively high revolution rates under (comparative to their size), quite high loadings. Outside of the cycle industry, applications include aeronautical, marine, and manufacturing assemblies.

Aluminium complex grease

Aluminium complex grease has many advantages in general industry but in terms of the cycle industry doesn’t offer significant improvements on lithium greases. Although it is very high temperature, has extremely good water-resisting properties, prevents rust, corrosion, and oxidation, and good shear stability, in terms of the performance envelope required for bicycles, it offers little advantage. Aluminium complex greases are widely used in the food industry and are also known to offer excellent results when used in the automotive, steel milling, construction, and farming settings.

Bentone (clay) grease

Bentone grease is a clay-based lubricant not really used in bicycle applications, although it is part of the formulation in some copper grease assembly compounds – we have included it here, for the sake of completeness. It uses a bentonite clay thickener. This grease type is known, because it has no determined drop-point, as a “non-melt” lubricant. Its main property is temperature change resistance, coupled to great wear and tear protection, exceptional water tolerance, good mechanical or shear stability, and impressive adhesiveness. Bentone grease is ideal for highly-demanding applications, often where replacement or maintenance are challenging. Typical uses are in the steel, manufacturing, construction, mining, and ceramic industry.

Polyurea grease

Polyurea grease is a more recently developed material, with very interesting characteristics - outstanding water resistance, great oxidation stability, rust and corrosion prevention, durability, versatility, good mechanical stability, as well as excellent temperature tolerance. With these features, polyurea grease is recommended for long-life applications such as derailleur pivot bolts and in electric motors found in e-bikes, where maintenance is often infrequent at best, or impossible at worst. In other industries, it has become considered vital for proper lubrication of steel-making plant and high-duty electric motors.

Sodium grease

Sodium grease uses a soda soap with additives and base oils. Such mixtures provide solid shear stability, a high dropping point, excellent rust protection, and good lubrication. Water resistance and oxidation stability is poor, though. In bicycles, sodium greases are often mixed with other materials to produce grease of higher quality but to produce value-for-volume. It can find application in areas where maintenance can be frequent, such as hubs but other materials are better resistors of corrosion and so tend to be used instead.

How these greases are described

All the seven families of greases described above are often referred to with a generic title - multipurpose (MP) greases, extreme pressure (EP) greases, marine greases, heavy-duty greases, specialty greases, automotive greases, industry greases, and so on, depending on the particular properties of the base oils, additives, and thickeners used in the process of manufacture and the quirks of the marketing department concerned.

Other factors to consider when choosing the right grease for your needs

Consistency

Consistency is a property defined by the National Lubricating Grease Institute (NLGI) used to determine the level of softness or hardness of every grease. Every grease is assigned a specific NLGI number that goes from 000 to 6. These NLGI grades are then used to express the level of consistency each grease has. So, for instance, NLGI grade 000 grease is completely fluid, NLGI grade 0 grease is described as very soft, NLGI 1 grease is soft, NLGI 2 grease is considered normal, NLGI 3 grease is firm, while NLGI 6 grease is defined as very hard. In bicycles, very soft greases might be found in aerosol form, where comparatively hard greases are often found in grease-gun cartridges. Generally, very hard greases are not used. Consistency can be independent of the soap thickener’s base metal or other material but dependant on other additives.

Viscosity

Grease viscosity determines its ability to remain stable and offer effective protection against friction. Higher viscosity provides greater stability when grease is exposed to heavy, slow loads, while lower viscosity is ideal for high-speed applications. In bicycles, we tend to use low viscosity greases as we are interested in being able to move one part against another with minimum resistance to that motion and very viscous greases can provide fluid resistance to that motion – think of ball-bearings moving within a bearing race, for instance. Like consistency, viscosity can be independent of the soap thickener’s base metal or other material but dependant on other additives.



Lubricants summary

As you can see from the foregoing, the type of oil or grease you decide to use, can matter a lot.

Each lubricant has a different set of characteristics that determine its consistency, viscosity, ability to prevent friction, reduce wear and tear, protect against rust, corrosion, and oxidation, maintain mobility, and stop water and other contaminants from coming into contact with the parts of the assembly it is used in.

Take all these factors into consideration before making a purchase and remember - the right grease for the job is the one that meets (and preferably surpasses) all the requirements you have.

In terms of the cycle industry, most vendors of grease who apply their own name to a product will already have selected for the qualities they feel are most important in their application. Rarely, vendors will actually tell you what or whose grease they have repackaged – as an example, Campagnolo marketed their “LB100” grease in their own packaging, which bore the manufacturer’s name and grease type – Kluber NB52 Isoflex Topas.

Assembly compounds

Not necessarily lubricants, there are a variety of assembly compounds that are used in bicycles. Like oils and greases, these are often offered under proprietary names but are a rebranded product of a specialist manufacturer, sometimes with specific “tweaks” by way of additives or other “enhancements” to differentiate them away from generic product or to otherwise make them unique to the company that is offering them.

The following notes are not exhaustive but are designed to offer a little insight into some of the materials that are commonly referred to.

Copaslip or copper grease

Copaslip (proprietary name) or copper grease is as the name suggests, a grease, frequently with a bentone soap, with fine particles of copper distributed into the material. It is not a lubricant grease but is sometimes recommended as a material to assist in the assembly of close fitting, metal parts.

It is highly temperature resistant, with some manufacturers offering materials stable at up to 1000 deg C plus and as such it has found application in braking systems, to allow free movement of brake pads against pistons in disc brake systems, for instance.

This material is often used in assembly of metal parts but care should be taken – some metals, including many alloys of aluminium, are reactive with the copper in copper grease in the presence of electrolytes, making it a potentially less-than-ideal material for the assembly of (say) aluminium alloy seatposts into steel frames. If “drying” of the grease “carrier” allows electrolyte (such as salt water) in, the copper may increase the risk of galvanic corrosion, rather than lessening it. Hence, as with other anti-seize materials, it still pays to disassemble, clean and refresh regularly.

Assembly Compound

This is a generic name for a range of materials that can be used to allow the seating of metal and / or non metallic components together. Compositions vary and the application should be checked against the manufacturer’s recommendations.Most such materials are based in a grease formulation of some sort. These materials are, like copper grease, not primarily formulated for lubrication but to prevent seizing, or sometimes of galling, where surfaces have a close fit to one another.

“Loctite”

Deliberately in speech marks above as “Loctite” is a proprietary name for a huge range of products from Henkel Group which range from permanent adhesives for parts that are not designed to be broken apart again, to products designed to reduce or remove the risk of galvanic corrosion between parts, to adhesives designed to, with varying degrees of permanence, prevent the movement of (typically threaded or closely-fitted) parts over or between one other.

Like “Hoover”, “Loctite” has become a generic name for many companies’ products which serve broadly similar purposes in the securing of fixtures and fittings.

These materials come, from a variety of manufacturers, in a variety of different formulations designed for quite specific sets of circumstances.

Correct selection is essential as not all such preparations are suited to use with materials, or they may require other preparations or activators to be used in combination with them in some circumstances – as ever, the manufacturer’s website and the Product Data Sheet are your friend.
Some of these materials have a combination of functions – so bearing seating compounds, like Loctite 641 are used to secure bearings or bearing carriers in their locations but have the ability to “cross gaps” and so compensate for poor fit, whilst others like various types of Wurth Thread Locker are used to lock a threaded fitting into place an, since they will only cure in the absence of atmospheric oxygen, are also useful in the prevention of galvanic corrosion, by excluding electrolytes from the coated areas.

Carbon fibre assembly compound

Often used to assemble carbon fibre composite parts to other components where otherwise, the presence of two very smooth surfaces together might case slippage, where no slippage (or no slippage under an applied pressure) is desirable – seatposts in frames, handlebar stems on fork columns and carbon handlebars in handlebar stem clamps would be typical applications.

In some cases the material can be used to lessen the effects of galvanic corrosion but like all such preparations, it’s not a “for life” solution – it’s a good idea to remove the components from one another, clean and re-apply this material regularly.

Some manufacturers, like Effetto Mariposa also offer “Carbo-Move” (EM’s proprietary name) to help release carbon components, typically seatposts, that have been neglected or poorly prepared and as a result ended up seized into place.

Further Information

Further information can be harvested from the websites of lubricant manufacturers. Velotech Cycling Ltd are indebted to the staff at Mobil, Kluber (UK), Loctite and Valvoline for their time and knowledge in drafting these notes.

Copyright Velotech Cycling Ltd 2021-22

GP210

Great !

sincos

That's very informative, thank you. Though I confess, I didn't understand much of it. Eg, I thought soaps are fatty acid salts, but that would make them amphoteric. Great for solubilizing grease, but wouldn't that attract water? Also, I don't understand how the metal is important (not that I ever paid much attention to them, I thought they were just spectator ions for charge balance). I foresee a deep dive into the chemistry of grease in the not too distant future ...