Bike maintenance, Scottish weather and flat living...

[Disastrous]

Hello all,

I picked up my first road bike over the weekend and had earmarked this evening for a trial run. Sadly, Glasgow weather has done its worst today and it's absolutely chucking it down. I'm not out off though, and keen to go anyway, but was thinking about the best way to clean the bike on my return...

In short, I live on the third floor, so don't have access to taps or a garage. The bike lives indoors and I'm looking to come up with the best way of maintaining it and keeping the flat reasonably clean.

Is a quick once over with a grubby towel enough to prevent damage to drivetrain co ponenta or do I need to be doing more. I've got some Teflon spray for once it's dried which should help, but would appreciate any advice from the seasoned veterans as I'm sure I'm not the first to have asked this!

Thanks

[Jimbo.]

Keep the bike parked over a mat/towel.
Wash it down in the shower/bath.
Don't bother with degreasing the living crap out of everything: just wipe the chain through a rag until clean and re-oil using something that doesn't stink.
Don't bother with Telfon spray, WD40 etc: it reeks, will taint everything and linger.
Keep some IPA (isopropyl alcohol) spray and use that for localised degreasing, wiping down the frame etc.

Edited by Jimbo. on Monday 27th August 17:13

[Disastrous]

Sigh. Just suggested this to the gf who explained at length that I wouldn't be washing 'that thing' in the bath.

In fairness, if you saw the tortuous angles that would needed to make this happen, you probably wouldn't want to either!

Dirty rag to clean do the job then?

[AyBee]

Those weed killer sprayers are quite useful if you're looking to give it a good clean and dry before putting it in the flat?

[Disastrous]

Good shout AyBee; I was thinking of one of them for a sort of 'weekend clean', if you know what I mean, as I can't see me running upstairs to fill it and carrying it back down every time (the bike would be gone by the time I got back!) but they'd be ideal for giving it a proper scrub, I reckon...

Was just a bit concerned about road grit in the drive train when it's wet but maybe I'm over-worrying...

[AyBee]

If it's the drive train you're worried about, just take a rag to it while it's wet to get the worst of the grime off it.

[joe58]

Would anything like this be useful if your keeping it inside and don't want the place to get messy?

http://www.gbcycles.co.uk/product/32401/SciCon_Whe...

[Disastrous]

joe58 said:

Would anything like this be useful if your keeping it inside and don't want the place to get messy?

http://www.gbcycles.co.uk/product/32401/SciCon_Whe...

That's quite cool! Good for chucking in the boot too..,

[Gizmoish]

Mine lives on a carpet offcut and gets wiped down with baby wipes on frame and rims.

Next purchase is a chain cleaner...

[Saddle bum]

Chains need to be cleaned thoroughly by removing and immersing in degreaser.

The grit in the rollers will become lapping paste and shag the chain in no time.

10sp chains only last 1500-2k miles ay best and at the best part of £30 a time, you want them to last.

[a11y_m]

Get a Scottoiler: that'll take care of keeping the drivechain clean and grit-free. And for the frame/bike just a weekly/bi-weekly/as-required using a garden sprayer.

Scottoiler chain lube is water-based so makes cleaning mega easy with just warm water required (no degreaser). Very thin though so means you need to fit an ugly as f**k reservoir to your bike, or (do what I do on my full-suss MTBs) and carry a 50ml spray bottle of lube to reapply if needed.