I think washing a bike in water and detergent or any product that turns grease into soap is a bad idea.

Ask your wife of girl friend why she doesn’t wash her hair right after she gets a perm.

Why would you remove all the protective oil and lubrication from your drive train and take it down to bare unprotected metal when all you really want to do is get the dirt and grit out?

If you have a non-plated chain then it is going to form a thin coat of rust in just the time it takes to dry once all the oil is removed. That rust is very abrasive and will mix with the new lubricant that you add.

The solution to all this is a product that is perfect for us, WD40. It comes out of the can under pressure and can be directed in a small focused stream that will dissolve and flow away the grit. It is formulated to displace any water that is trapped inside the links of your chain and is designed to inhibit rust.


As to the recent turn of this thread…. Steel is not iron with bits in it to make it stronger. There is no iron in steel. Steel is made from iron ore in a blast furnace that blows oxygen into molten iron to add carbon atoms to its chemical structure and change it into steel.
Other metals in small amounts are added to steel to make all the different types used in manufacturing, this is called alloying. All the various types of stainless steels are a class of steel alloys, so they are all ferris metals, but most are not magnetic.