At work, I've found that this works well:

1. clean chain with a Park Tool chain scrubber filled with Finish Line Citrus Degreaser, which is quite potent.

2. dump out the used citrus degreaser and run the scrubber with sudsy hot water (Dawn dish detergent here). Dump and repeat. This "annihilates" the remaining citrus degreaser.

3. If desired, run a rinse cycle with plain hot water.

4. Blow out chain with compressed air. In most cases, the chain is now clean and jingly-dry.

5. Re-lube immediately with whatever lube makes sense for the rider and prevailing conditions.


During step 1, if the chainrings and cassette need cleaning, I'll take some time to run the chain through all the gears to get some of the citrus degreaser on them, and let them soak a few minutes if they're nasty. At this point, I generally remove the rear wheel, replace it with a dummy hub, and scrub a little with a stiff brush that gets between the rings and cogs. Then I hit them with the Simple Grean Foaming Degreaser spray. I don't know what the deal is between the FL Citrus Degreaser and the Simple Green spray, but when they meet, the grime just POURS off the metal. The results are very good. You know you cleaned it well when the customers accuse you of installing a new chain.

In the big picture, there's no point going overboard if we're talking about a winter commuting bike. Lube the chain with a wet lube, wipe it down, maybe "floss" between your cassette cogs with a rag, and that's a solid start.