I've been thinking that a much quicker way to clean chain/cassette/chainrings etc would be to chuck them in an ultrasonic tank rather than spending ages scrubbing them.

Before I go ahead and buy enough cleaning fluid to adequately fill my ultrasonic tank, has anyone else tried this? Did it work? Does it make a hideous mess of the tank?

I also use the tank for cleaning clock parts so need to keep it clean - the last thing I can have is bike grease gunking up a clock I'm trying to clean!

I believe a few guys in the C&V forum do it. Did you try a serch on it. I don't thave a place for a tank but I got think thinking the other day when I was brushing my teeth with my Sonic Care tooth brush........ But at $120 I am not buying another one.

It works fine. I use Simple Green + water, in varying concentrations, depending on how grubby the part is. If what you are cleaning is small, you can fill the tank with plain water, put the part in a glass container with the cleaning solution, and put the container in the tank. Glass is pretty transparent to ultrasonic frequencies.

I've been experimenting with the ultrasonic. It's my understanding you can put your cleaning solution and bike part(s) in a glass jar, and then put that into the ultrasonic cleaner (filled with water). I haven't tried it yet myself, but it sounds like an easy way to keep the cleaner itself clean. By the way, even if you just stick your parts directly in the cleaner (no glass jar), it is pretty easy to wipe it out afterwards.

Unless you have a larger ultrasonic tank, you may have to do chainrings a section at a time (by rotating them).

For my 1:10 simple green to water solution, it took like 3 cycles at full time (500secs) to get it completely clean. Heating it seems to help. I know a higher concentration will likely speed things up. I don't know if I will continue to use simple green, especially since I can use the glass jar method.

What I failed to do was heat the chain after rinsing with water. Be sure to get all the water out. FBinNY suggested putting in the oven for 20min @ 200deg.

After removing the water, I'm considering putting the chain back in a glass jar of lube, and back in the ultrasonic cleaner for one more round - to get the lube deep into the chain. Maybe someone can chime in if they've tried this before.

I work in the dental field, and we use ultrasonic tanks to clean dentures and the like. What we do is, fill the tank with water, we then bag the denture in cleaning solution and put the bag in the tank. This prevents contamination of the tank with germs and works well.

This sounds like a great idea, especially for chainrings.

"What I failed to do was heat the chain after rinsing with water. Be sure to get all the water out. FBinNY suggested putting in the oven for 20min @ 200deg."
I'd suggest you set the oven to 250 degrees or so, to ensure that the water is vaporized; liquid water can hide in the tiny spaces between the pins, rollers and plates for a surprisingly long time unless you boil it out by getting it to 212 degrees.

I assumed he meant 200 degrees C, way over the boiling point of water.

Thanks everybody for your thoughts. My tank is large enough to put chainrings in and immerse them completely so no need to faff with rotating them and cleaning parts at a time. Truth be told if I had to do that I'd figure it was quicker and easier to just scrub them with a stiff brush.

I don't have anything big enough to contain chainrings or cassettes for cleaning so the glass jar approach is out, although the bag idea sounds promising. I might just give that a try, it will also mean I can hopefully get away without needing a gallon or more of cleaning solution.

I guess tomorrow it's off to the bike shop, I don't have much cleaning solution left at the moment.

I know you said your tank is large enough to fully submerge the chainring, but I was thinking of my smaller tank (the one many use from HF) and the issue of having to rotate chainrings (doing half at a time). I had a thought. It seems one could completely fill a gallon size zip lock with cleaner solution, drop in the chainring(s), and then drop the bag it into the smaller ultrasonic tank of water. The full bag would extend above the cleaner's tank's top. Would the ultrasonic waves still penetrate the entire bag's contents, or just the portion below the water level?

The instructions on mine say that you shouldn't let any part being cleaned touch the bottom of the tank as apparently it interferes with the ultrasonic waves it generates.

I think (although I don't fully understand how ultrasonic cleaning works, so could be wildly off here) that the idea is that the ultrasonic waves pass through the water into your container, so it should clean everything that's within the cleaning fluid inside the bag.

Tin cans work very well for cleaning containers. Laundry detergent is very good and cheap on anything that can stand the high pH. The dirtied the part the more concentrated the solution. Ed

The ultrasonic tanks we use in dentistry have a "hopper" that suspends the items above the bottom of the tank. You just lift the whole hopper out, let the water/cleaner drain out back into the tank, and remove the items from the hopper. Ultrasonics clean by creating waves of energy in the fluid that the item is suspended in, which help loosen any debris.

The explanation I've seen for UC is that it creates microscopic bubbles that strike a rigid surface at 10k psi and 10k degrees F. Google Branson

My LBS owner uses a ultrasonic cleaner on dirty parts. He places items in hot water, adds a few drops of detergent to break the water tension and lets the machine do its job. I don't know how he dries stuff afterwards, but he says you will need to oil chains extra thoroughly because it strips out all the lubricant down to bare metal.

I picked up the Harbor Freight ultrasonic cleaner recently and like it a lot as cleaning old parts was my least favorite chore. If something is super gunky, it might not completely remove the gunk, but a quick brush with an old toothbrush cleans it with ease afterwards. So much better than the old days hovering over the utility sink for so much time. In my use, the cleaner and amount you use seems to make a difference. I've liked simple green the best so far. However, I know some caution about using simple green on aluminum parts. I haven't noticed anything, but since I'm cleaning really old parts that aren't very special, I might just not notice. Might want to check into it if you're using it to clean anything fancy. I haven't tried laundry detergent. Some people like that.

Its just a personal opinion but I think all oily solvents leave grit behind. I really think you need detergent and water to remove the last little bit. Ed

I clean the chain in the ultrasonic cleaner and use a rag rapped around a thin metel ruler to clean the cogs. You turn the wheel backwards and the rag cleans the cogs. I use the same system to clean the chainrings.

I have a fair size table top Omegasonics unit, and it works as a great labour saving device for cleaning chains, cassettes, bearings and stuff like that, but I'm careful about using it for aluminum parts such as cranks and chainrings.
The problem with cranks is mostly cosmetic, (they can become discoloured in my experience), but the issue with chainrings is more serious.
depending on the frequency of the ultrasonic unit, prolonged exposure can cause hydrogen embrittlement of aluminum parts, so if you're dropping your chainrings in there, don't forget about them and leave them in there too long.
When I first purchased the unit, I bought a 20 liter container of solvent from the manufacturer. it worked pretty good, but when it was used up, I bought some of Safety Kleen's ultrasonic cleaner solvent, and it works even better.
Have not used the machine very much since I closed the shop, but every now and then I fire it up to make a chain nice and sparkly.

Watch out with Simple Green, it stripped some of the anodizing on nice parts. Any more, I use Dawn dish washing detergent (diluted of course).

Your problem is that the most effective solvents for cleaning chains and freewheels are petroleum distillates such as OMS or naphtha. These cannot be used directly in an ultrasonic for 2 reasons.

1- most ultrasonic cleaners are tuned for water/detergent mixes, and the impedance of petroleum solvents aren't right, which can cause the transducers to overheat. This isn't always true but is something to ask the maker before it becomes an expensive repair.

2- you never use flammable solvents in an ultrasonic because the sound energy increases evaporation and therefore the flame hazard.

But there is an approach which solves these problems, saves you money, and prevents contamination of your cleaner, and that's to use the so-called double boiler method.

I use glass baking/casserole pans which fit across my ultrasonic, and can be supported on the rim, while sitting in the solution. Glass is transparent to high frequency sound, so there's no loss of power, the pans have tight covers which solve the evaporation problem, are small enough that only a bit of solvent is needed, and it's easy to change so I can switch to rinse quickly.

Best of all, there's no serious cleanup, since nothing goes into the ultrasonic itself.

Most commercial ultrasonic makers have some info about this method, and sell accessories for it, but the $3.99 glass pans from the supermarket are way cheaper and work just as well.

The very basic description from my user manual is that it creates tiny bubbles that appear and implode, lifting the dirt off the item. How it works, how the bubbles appear, and why their implosion lifts the dirt off the item are the bits I don't understand.

Sounds like some more time on Google is required.

Interesting idea. I just may try that. I've used a glass beaker set in the basket, but the problem with that is that it protrudes too high and the lid won't fit.
For small pieces, too small to be contained in the mesh basket, I've been using a stainless food strainer, which works OK, but I think the fine mesh may be less transparent to the waves than glass is.

You don't have to cover the unit, just the beaker. If you can't find a plastic cover for the beaker, use food wrap film and a rubber band (unless your solvent dissolves the film).

Search "cavitation" and you'll get more info.

Basically, since water can't stretch, pulling it apart creates spaces. You might have seen this happens when running a speedboat propeller too fast. Sound is a compression wave, alternatingly squeezing and pulling the medium (water) apart, so as high energy sound passes through water, small cavities are created then immediately collapsed.

This action doesn't actually do anything in terms of cleaning by itself. It's just mechanical action like the agitator in a washing machine, but it's the cleaning solvent that actually does the cleaning. Imagine the difference between dipping something in a lake to clean it, and holding it under the surf at the beach.