2TriMaster2

True. But outside - they just float away. I understand though being cautious though. That's a good thing. Hey, even a stove can kill you. That's why I cook with the oven door closed.

canklecat

Annnd now you're just trolling. Thanks for playing "Let's Internet, Kids!" See you next time.

Bike Gremlin

+1

You can also reuse mineral spirits. I leave them in a jar, let them sit, then pour into a new jar, leaving the dirt sit on the bottom.

IrishBrewer

I like mineral spirits too (not the milky white stuff marketed as green). I filter it through a cone coffee filter into a jar and get lots of uses out of it. Diesel fuel works well too and is cheap and reusable in the same way and not as volatile as gasoline.

up on two

A visibly clean chain can still be dirty. If the interior links and pins have grit in them, lubing the chain can accelerate wear by keeping the grit inside and letting it act as a file to your chain.

Either do a thorough cleaning on your chain, or do nothing. Either way, you can expect about 3,000 miles from a chain. I know, some do more, other get less and I think that depends on the riding conditions more than owner maintenance.

dr_lha

I typically lube, wipe and then relube my chain.

I don't ever bother cleaning it either with soaking or with one of those spinny brush things (I own one).

Last chain I replaced had 4500 miles on it, and I replaced it before it got too stretched (as measured by steel rule and chain checker). Current chain is nearing 4000 miles and doesn't need replacing yet.

At the end of the day, a replacement chain typically costs $20-30, unless you're buying top end. Replacing a chain is a simple job.

leob1

Use a Gatorade bottle, or any with an opening larger than a soda bottle, to make it easier to get the chain in and out. Fill half way with OMS, shake. Remove chain, let dry, or blow with compressed air. Reinstall, lube, ride. If you it take more than 30 minutes your doing to much extra stuff.

Scooper

Zep citrus degreaser, brass wire brush, shop rag, old newspapers on the floor.

Doug5150

I do not understand why you bother with the soap and water mess when you are soaking it in mineral spirits anyway? The mineral spirits is a far better method for de-greasing than the soap and water is.

Also you should not need "a long soak" in mineral spirits. Just 15-30 seconds should be enough to get ALL the grease off, at room temperature.

???

When I degrease parts I tend to use acetone or toluene, but I have those two solvents around for other reasons. Others that work are gasoline, kerosene, xylene, isopropyl alcohol and Everclear (the booze).

kingston 

I use wax on one of my bikes. The key is starting with a clean chain. Molten Speed Wax has the best instructions for cleaning a chain I have found online.

cyccommute 

While I agree with you on using mineral spirits, this statement needs some clarification. Acetone, isopropyl alcohol and ethanol (everclear) are all polar compounds that don't do a good job of dissolving oils and greases. They may remove the oil and grease but it will take longer and require more solvent.

Gasoline, xylene and toluene will work well but they aren't safe materials to use. They all have significant long term and less significant short term toxicity.

They all have significant flammability risks associated with using them with gasoline being the most hazardous in that respect. Gasoline has an extremely low flash point...-40°F...and is highly flammable at every temperature you might use it at. Xylene and toluene have significantly higher flash points, 43°F and 90°F respectively, but they are more toxic than odorless mineral spirits.

Kerosene is a very good solvent for oil and grease. It's not toxic. The problem is that it isn't volatile enough. While all of the other solvents you've mentioned evaporate quickly, kerosene takes a long time to evaporate if it does so at all. It's just too much like an oil to begin with.

Overall, mineral spirits does everything you need it to do when it comes to cleaning a chain. It doesn't take much, it's not too flammable, it evaporates quickly and cleanly and you can reuse it for a very long time.

Scooty Puff Jr

And hope you don't generate a static electric charge.

Fynn

I've ridden over 70,000 miles the last several years mainly on dirt and gravel. What I've learned about chain cleaning is that it should be like a good saddle. You shouldn't have to think about it much. Use lube sparingly and the chain will pretty much clean itself- at least well enough to function properly.

Riding on roads with a lot of abrasive dirt/sand kicks that material onto your chain. You can either stress over it or just ride your bike and realize you're going to have to replace the chain and cassette every 1200 miles or so.

Doug5150

I normally use acetone for cleaning metal machine parts; it works pretty well and requires no scrubbing at all. Paint stores sell it. It is flammable but Wiki says the toxicity of acetone and mineral spirits is about the same.

Gasoline works pretty well too, is pretty cheap and is easy to obtain everywhere.
It is a carcinogen, but that effect is only from long-term exposure.
If you only clean your chain 3-4 times a year, outside, and using only a small bit of gasoline, the amount of fume exposure is pretty insignificant. (Some of us pump gas into our cars every week!... )

Toluene works really well but is rather nasty to handle. Xylene is slightly-less-toxic than toluene.
Either will work really well, it comes down to the prices of each. Paint stores for tradesmen have these or can order them, but they're really kind of overkill for this. Toluene will remove any kind of grease or oil, plus a lot of paints and ink, and it will dissolve a lot of plastics/rubber/urethane too.

The only solvent stronger than toluene is probably benzene, but (in the 1st world) that's not available to ordinary mortals anymore.

Phyoomz

That Sheldon Brown method is the only thing a real cyclist would ever use.

ARPRINCE

I use SIMPLE GREEN as a cleaning solution with the parktool chain cleaning gadget.

If I'm removing the chain (KMC missing link), I use SG with a dab of dishwasher soap on a pan. Let it stay for a few mins then scrub. Wash with water and dry with an air compressor.

Doug5150

Well here is another problem: when cleaning a typical press-pinned chain, you really don't want to use water at all...

The way that bicycle chains are constructed is that they use hardened carbon-steel pins pressed into side plates that may or may not be hardened, stainless, or plated. The hardened pins are very susceptible to rusting. The main danger is water causing corrosion on the pins and allowing them to become loose inside the plate, where they begin to work out.

Outside of bicycle use, the main reason to oil a roller chain is to keep it from rusting--not because it needs any actual lubricant. There's been numerous tests of bicycle chain lubes through the years and most of them show that there is very little difference at all in terms of mechanical lubrication performance--because there's almost no friction present to eliminate in the first place.

Spoonrobot 

I just spray it with a hose real close in as I turn the pedals slowly. Works really well and mechanical removal of contaminants seems like a better deal all around that the chemical means being debated above. Ride a few miles til it's dry and then lube.

Gasoline?

ARPRINCE

^^ I dry it with an air compressor after the water rinse. Then I lube.

On occasions, I wash my bike too like below:


Can't complain since I have not have any issues with rusting on my chain. But I see your point there.

ausfix

I knew a woman who badly burned her face and neck when she walked across a carpet carrying her boyfriend's motorcycle gas tank. A static charge ignited the fuel vapors. She had to get multiple skin grafts and her face was permanently disfigured, horribly so. She became a doctor herself.

cyccommute 

It's not about the toxicity but the efficacy. Mineral spirits works on petroleum based grease and oil because it is closely related to those compounds. It's also non-polar while acetone is much more polar...think salad dressing. Acetone will barely do the job while mineral spirits does the same job better.

The exposure isn't through inhalation alone. It can also be through dermal contact. Both can lead to health problem through long term exposure.

Yes, I know that we pump gasoline into our cars every week...and because of it we have a laissez-faire attitude towards it. It's a material you shouldn't be using for anything other than placing it in a sealed tank and handling it in very controlled conditions.

Toluene...nor xylene for that matter... isn't any nastier to handle than gasoline. In fact gasoline contains significant quantities of both depending on the time of year and grade of the gasoline. Higher octane gasoline has more xylene and toluene in it and there is more in summer fuel blends than winter blends. BTX (benzene/toluene/xylene) are added in the summer to reduce the vapor pressure of gasoline so that it doesn't vapor lock the vehicle.

Because it is toxic and flammable. It's not a compound that anyone...even chemists...use much any more.

But for cleaning of chains or parts, none of the BTX compounds are needed. Mineral spirits works just as well without the toxicity or flammability.

Doug5150

Yea but water = rust, if you were being picky. Did you get that part?

Also: gasoline works pretty well as a parts cleaner.
Ever been to a gas station?
Ever seen the big oil spots where everybody parks their cars while they're pumping gas?
Ever seen the clean spots where people spilled gasoline on the ground?
How did you think those spots got clean?

You can use whatever you want, but keep in mind that no "real" machine parts cleaner has water in it.
The same gunk you struggle to scrub off with soap and water will basically disappear in any halfway-reasonable cleaning solution.

Not as I've seen it.
Also we note: the main ingredients in most carburetor cleaners and parts cleaning solutions is toluene, xylene, methyl chloride and/or acetone.
Of those four, acetone is the least-toxic and usually the easiest to obtain. Any store that sells indoor and outdoor paints usually has it on the shelves, in quart cans.
Can you link to any commercially-made parts cleaner that DOESN'T use any of these things, and uses mineral spirits instead?

Toluene: I've seen that toluene seems to be rather more reactive than acetone or gasoline, but I didn't do actual testing. That's just from seeing how fast it can get crud off, and how many plastic and rubber parts it's eaten... And it was just a mention, not a recommendation anyway.

All this stuff has long-term exposure risks, but how often do you clean your chain?
Every day?
Or only 4-6 times a year?
"Brief periods of exposure a few times a year" isn't long-term exposure by any standards. Many, many people are exposed to gasoline fumes weekly if not more often.

DrIsotope

Once again, the key here is to stop wasting your time and choice of chemical on cleaning chains. Wipe it down with a rag every few days. Lube as required. Throw it away when stretched. I completely stopped cleaning them like 3 chains ago. Absolutely no difference in longevity or performance. The only thing I still do is clean the cassette cogs and chainrings before putting on the fresh chain. And I do that in the sink with a 99¢ scrub brush and some Dawn.

Spoonrobot 

Come now, it's not an instantaneous reaction. My chains never have a chance to rust since I spray, ride to dry and then lube all within 20 minutes. Every now and again when I discard a chain I will push a few pins out and inspect the pins and plates under my 90x Aliexpress microscope. Have yet to see anything that would indicate water/air oxidization.

I don't struggle to clean my chain. The water pressure from a regular garden hose mechanically removes the dirt and old lubricant build up just fine.

It remains that gasoline is a poor choice for parts cleaners. No "real" machine parts cleaner has gasoline in it.

cyccommute 

Maybe in 1960 but I doubt anyone uses gasoline to clean up oil spots...if they clean them at all...now. No boss in his right mind would allow an employee to clean up anything with gasoline. OSHA and the EPA would come down on them like a ton of bricks.

I agree that there are problems with water but there are lots of parts cleaners that are water based. Cintas and others offer water based parts cleaners. I'm not a fan of the idea but they do exist.

A carburetor cleaner is a different beast than a parts cleaner. Few carburetor cleaners use methylene chloride anymore as it's too toxic. Yes, acetone is used in carburetor cleaner but it is used in a mixture with toluene but not as a stand alone solvent. Carburetors also have different cleaning requirements than do bicycle chains. It's not like carburetors have a whole lot of oil and grease in them...they don't work well if they do.

Commercial parts cleaners that use organic solvents don't contain acetone nor methylene chloride. Nor do they contain significant amounts of toluene nor xylenes. Those materials are called "aromatics" for a reason and you could certainly smell them if they were present in large quantities. The solvents used in the commercial parts cleaners are low odor, low vapor pressure, high flash point mineral spirits mixtures.

What kind of damage various solvents do to plastic parts depends on the plastic of the part and the solvent. It's not something that can be easily predicted and is sometimes counter intuitive. Toluene is incompatible with most all elastomeric polymers while acetone is compatible with some but incompatible with others.

The point, however, isn't the effect that toluene or acetone have on parts but the effect that they have on grease and oil. Polar compounds like acetone and alcohols just aren't that good a solvent for grease and oil. Mineral spirits is far more efficient and less difficult to handle.

Personally, I clean my chain once..when it is installed. I then use a lubricant that doesn't attract dirt and isn't grimy so that I don't have to constantly clean my chain. However, other people read these threads and some clean their weekly so their exposure is higher.

On the other hand, if the gas station is operating properly, the customer shouldn't be exposed to gas fumes at all. Modern cars and gas stations are supposed to reduce the release of gasoline fumes to extremely low levels to avoid releasing ozone causing hydrocarbons.