White Spirit is about £7 or £8 for 4ltes from B&Q. Half fill a 400ml wide mouth plastic juice bottle Oasis or similar,drop the chain in and replace the screw top,give it a good shake for a few minute or so,tip the now dirty WS into a clean jar(empty bolognese sauce jars are ideal) with the chain still in the juice bottle,pour some more WS in,give it a good shake again. The chain should now be spotlessly clean,if not repeat. Fish the chain out of the bottle,pull it through an old rag or towel,leave it hung up on a nail outside for 20minutes for the WS to evaporate. Whilst the chain is drying off,use Astonish degreaser on the cassette making sure only to apply it (with a 2inch paint brush) to the lower rear quarter of the cassette rotating rearward as I work my way around the cogs,I then spray a hose in the same place making the cassette to freewheel with the force of the water.I follow this up with a few squirts of GT85 to displace any water left on the cassette.I also treat the chainset to the same degreaser,and wash off,etc.I'm careful not to get any degreaser or water on the wheel or BB bearings. Jockey wheels are then first scraped clean of crud,I find the rounded end of a 6inch steel rule ideal for this job.I then squirt them with GT85 and a wipe with a rag before squirting the bearings(between pulley and steel disc)with semi fluid aerosol grease from both sides wiping off any excess. All clean and dried off,replace the now clean and dry chain,lube up with TF2 aerosol lube,backpedal it through an old rag to remove any excess lube and repeat.
This whole operation is carried out wearing heavy duty nitril gauntlet gloves to protect my hands from the degreaser,WS and lubes.
NOTE:-the major plus with White Spirit is that left to settle in the sauce jar with the lid on to prevent spillage it can be used over again a minimum of at least six times.
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"All we are not stares back at what we are"
W H Auden
Bonefishblues wrote:I want to know if there are any best Bolognese brand jars to use for decanting. This post is hopelessly short on detail
Ah! Nail,head,on,and I'm glad you ask as it's such an important part of the cleaning process.Lloyd Grossman sauce jars have,after rigorous testing over a long period of time,become the default go to jar of preference. Though Lldl sauce jars are also in use,I tend to push those examples to the back of the shelf out of sight should anyone enter the workshop,not that I'm snobbish in any way,but one mustn't give the wrong impression one standards are slipping,must one?
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"All we are not stares back at what we are"
W H Auden
re suitable containers for shaky-cleaning; I have a stainless steel cocktail shaker to experiment with. I am not terribly optimistic that it won't get all dented. The other thing I have wondered is if adding something (eg a few old ball bearings?) to the mix might help shift the crud more quickly.
I clean the chain using a degreaser and shake in a bottle when I rotate my chains, approx 1000 mile intervals. At the same time I strip, clean and regrease the jockey wheels. What interval do others go for. Ps they don't salt the rural roads near us anymore so no more worried about salt corrosion, and I've not plucked up the courage to finish the chain in the dishwasher yet.
At the last count:- Peugeot 531 pro, Dawes Discovery Tandem, Dawes Kingpin X3, Raleigh 20 stowaway X2, 1965 Moulton deluxe, Falcon K2 MTB dropped bar tourer, Rudge Bi frame folder, Longstaff trike conversion on a Giant XTC 840
ndwgolf wrote:I ordered the WD40 degreaser. I will give it a go and feedback after I’ve tried it. Neil
I'm a trendy consumer. Just look at my stupid phone.
IMHO it is a very expensive way of buying solvent. It is handy for wiping purposes, simply because it dispenses more easily and obviously won't evaporate or spill so easily. But for cleaning chains? Hmmm.
It will help to shift the crud from the outside of the chain but it will also wash some of it into the insides of the chain (listen for a gritty sound when flexing a 'freshly cleaned' chain). IME chains which are dirty in the bushings wear out quickly, and I don't think you will get the insides of the chain clean without using about half a can of solvent on it each time.
Brucey wrote:re suitable containers for shaky-cleaning; I have a stainless steel cocktail shaker to experiment with. I am not terribly optimistic that it won't get all dented. The other thing I have wondered is if adding something (eg a few old ball bearings?) to the mix might help shift the crud more quickly.
cheers
It's a bit of a rum do with the ball bearings in with the chain and all that shaking,but I s'pose it would make a good piener collider
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"All we are not stares back at what we are"
W H Auden
