Cycling UK Forum

Just planning a new bike and am looking for recommendations for cleaning.

I've seen a couple of Youtube videos of people using Chinese ultrasonic cleaners with aqueous degreasers on chains, cassettes and chainrings and the results look really good. Far cleaner than I can get them immersing them in an ice cream tub or using brushes.

(It would also help as I have to carry bike and buckets downstairs to clean bike and I can never get it really clean)

Presumably it would be fine on metal parts, but not parts that have grease or bearings?

I can't see what you shouldn't use one... as long as you can regrease to your satisfaction.

Jonathan

Hmm, have used ultrasonic cleaning baths at work but only for small items and/or in semiconductor manufacture.

Bike cleaning is an interesting concept to me, I oil and maintain the moving bits and wipe down the frame if it gets very muddy but otherwise my bikes just go dirty. However I am talking road riding, not off-road.

My car suffers the same fate, it's lucky if it gets an annual wash

Haven't you got a dishwasher?

st599_uk wrote: ↑20 Sep 2021, 2:55pmPresumably it would be fine on metal parts, but not parts that have grease or bearings?

They're used all the time for servicing scuba diving equipment (regulators, gauges and the like) which get encrusted with salt, corrosion and gunge. Although this will be using different chemicals (e.g. citric acid) the task would be no different to cleaning delicate metal bits on bikes so you'll have no problems other than finding the most effective chemicals to use on oily/gungy bike bits Many diving equipment parts need to be re-greased afterwards so I don't see any problem with ultrasonically cleaning bike bearings if you've got the right grease to repack them with. My local dive technician has tried all sorts of these cleaners out, and has settled for the ones that you occasionally get on sale in Lidl/Aldi, as being the most cost-effective when taking purchase cost and service life into account - apparently, they do just as good a job as any others so the only thing you'd need to check is that the bath is big enough for the bits you want to clean.

(Edit: there is one obvious difference between the diving and cycling world, i.e. any critical bits of dive kit will always be stainless. So you'd need to factor in some means of quickly expelling any water, the same as you would after cleaning your chain with a water-based solvent.)

You want a Rowasher.
Like any decent bikeshop uses!

I have a little 4” jewellery cleaner which is good on chains, smaller cogs

I bought on eBay Chinese one for around £30, 5 years ago.
Brilliant piece of kit. I use a detergent and run the tank at 60 deg.
Chains come out looking like new

With no manufacturers grease left on it!

I have an ultrasonic machine - tank about as big as a domestic deep fat fryer - very good using water and about an egg-cup full of Screwfix cheapest degreaser. Cassettes, mechs, small parts etc come out of the bath like new

BUT not for chains unless you want to go through the process of immersing the cleaned chain in a bath of stiff oil and leaving it for 24 hours to get the lube back in the links. Best stuff I've found for cleaning chains is the Fenwicks foam spray

robgul wrote: ↑22 Sep 2021, 8:30am...
BUT not for chains unless you want to go through the process of immersing the cleaned chain in a bath of stiff oil and leaving it for 24 hours to get the lube back in the links. Best stuff I've found for cleaning chains is the Fenwicks foam spray...

Or, actually perfect for chains if you're going to go over to a wax based lubricant.

Having to remove a chain or cassette or chainrings to clean them is too much of a PITA in my book. I just use the Park chain cleaner with several changes of solvent, then dump the solvent back into a 4L plastic container. By keeping several of these containers (they're what white spirit, turps, etc are originally supplied in), and rotating through them, virtually all the crap that comes off the chains, cassettes and chainrings has fallen to the bottom of the container by the time I come to use the solvent in the same container again. After many years of use, some of these containers have the best part of an inch of crud in the bottom of them, but the solvent above is quite clear when I come to re-use it after several weeks.

I know there are many fans of the Park chain cleaner or similar but they’re not for me. I’ve used mine twice and abandoned it. The thing sprays filthy solvent/cleaner all over the floor and lower rear end of the bike, including spokes, rim and tyre if you’ve not removed the wheel. Nice and quick for a busy commuter but not for a retired recreational cyclist like me

If I were buying a bike my focus would be riding not cleaning the thing.

mumbojumbo wrote: ↑23 Sep 2021, 7:20am If I were buying a bike my focus would be riding not cleaning the thing.

Looks like "belt drive" could be your thing!