howaboutme

I'm wondering what I'm doing wrong or can do better when I clean my bike, specifically my drive train.

I do a wash every so often, which includes scrubbing the chainring, gears and chain to a point that it looks free of grease/oil. I let that dry and the lube the chain w/ Wolf tooth lube. I also use WD40 (reg one) on the moving parts of the derailleurs, being careful not to get it on anything else. For degreaser, I use a diluted simple green (reg one).

Here's the question. After just one ride, my chain and gears are coated in black, assuming it's grease. I figure it should take a bit longer for my drivetrain to look that dirty. Am I doing something wrong? Am I really not getting my chain as clean as I think? Any advice?

Barry2 

I recently started waxing chains. Haven’t been at it long enough to decide if I like it.
But the one ride black chain has gone.
Its also a lot easier and quicker than I expected.

Barry

Oh, and WD-40 (reg) is not a lube.
WD-40 (brand) does make a silicon lube.

Mr. 66

Don’t worry about wd-40, that’s mild and won’t hurt your finish.

I, myself don’t use simple green on my bike. That can hurt your finish and can corrode, or embrittlement of metal if not used and cleaned up properly.

I oil my chains, I’ll use wd-40 as a wipe down cleaner, sometimes. Every once in a while I’ll do a solvent bath of the chain. The bath, and gravity, gets most all of the uck. You may still need to lightly brush some crud, some compressed air, a second bath.

I usually don’t clean a chain until after it’s been used in rainy weather, or gritty conditions.

howaboutme

Thanks all!

I understand the simple green issue but I thoroughly rinse everything out with water plus I diluted to at least 7:1 to eliminate any possible future corrosion.

I'm just wondering if I'm not cleaning my chain right or if I just ride in a dirty area (decent amount of cars, its warm so we have bugs, pollen, etc in the air).

t2p

I use Rock and Roll lube - so the drivetrain / bike is relatively clean

if I get a bike that has a dirty / grease and oil covered drivetrain - I typically spray / clean it with WD-40 and then (after wiping off excess gunk etc) will then apply Rock and Roll chain lube

t2p

pollen, bugs etc probably won’t hurt the drivetrain as much as cleaners, degreasers, water, etc

Mtracer

I use a drip wax (Squirt), but even then the chain gets more or less black. But nowhere near like it does with oil or synthetic lubes. My hands will still get dirty if I handle the chain and I can still get chain marks on the back of my leg. But even these are no where near as bad with the drip wax.

I think I read somewhere that this black may be from car tire residue on roads. I don't know about that, but it's not unreasonable to think there could be something on road surfaces that causes this. Even car brake dust.

We all have different requirements. I happen to ride in a very dry area. I never ride in the rain as it's simply too easy to avoid a rainy day. The Squirt drip wax works really well for me. Maintenance is very easy. When I re-lube about every 200-300 miles, I first wipe the chain down with a rag slightly dampened with mineral spirits. The idea is to just get the gunk off the outside of the chain where it does no good anyway.

Then I put a drop of Squirt on every roller, one at a time. That's not as tedious as it sounds. But many just stream it on while back pedaling. I run the bike through the gears just to spread any excess on a range of cogs and a light wipe on the outside of the chain to remove excess, before the drip wax dries. That's it.

With this approach I never feel the need to clean the drive train of build up beyond what I described. While there is a little dirty looking wax on the cogs, I generally don't feel any need to try to remove it. I can put several thousand miles on a chain and have no measurable chain stretch. And when I twist the chain, there is none of that grinding sound from grit. So, it seems to be doing a great job of keeping it lubed and keeping the grit out.

Anyway, there are a lot of ways to skin this cat, this is my way.

mpetry912 

depends on where you live. I use just a quick spritz of automotive degreaser, and then soapy water (dawn ultra) with a splash of kerosene, scrub with a toothbrush, spray rinse with hose, blow off with shop air.

I use the silca drip lube and very pleased with it. Clean running. I do wipe off with a clean wipe every couple rides. Chain almost never comes off the bike

/markp

Jeff Wills

You are cleaning off the outside dirt and then applying lube, which works its way into the chain and liquifies the lube & grease there. This then moves out and coats the drivetrain.

I wipe my chain and chainrings the first couple rides after cleaning & lubing. When the rag doesn’t come away black, it’s good until the next clean & lube session.

If you want to get your chain completely clean, follow the ShelBroCo method:

https://www.sheldonbrown.com/chainclean.html

howaboutme

I'm beginning to think it may be the lube. Before the Wolf Tooth, I used Finish Line (before that it was brand new) and I don't remember it getting black so soon. I'll continue to work on the work flow and try different lubes.

smd4

In this post and your first one, you fail to mention a very important step in the lubrication process. Assuming you don’t do it, that would result in the condition you describe.

That step is to completely wipe off all of the lubrication you just applied (after back pedaling the chain for a few revolutions).

Do you perform this very important step?

howaboutme

Yes I do because I do it after I scrub the entire drivetrain during a bike wash. Perhaps I'm not doing it well enough.

smd4

I don’t mean after a wash. I mean after you apply chain lube. You don’t want any oil on the outside of your chain.

After you oil the chain and rotate the crank a few times to let the oil get into the links, get a rag, use it to grab the chain at the bottom, and while you’re grabbing the chain, run the cranks backwards several times to remove as much oil as possible.

howaboutme

Yeah, I've done that too. Perhaps not enough. I'm still learning about maintaining the bike so really trying to dial in my routine.It does look like there's too much oil.

smd4

There should be NO OIL visible.

Duragrouch

Simple Green does not do a good job of dissolving oil on chains, I had tried soaking chains in a solution overnight, poor.

I now clean the chain with mineral oil as solvent, only because near-full bottles of tiki torch fuel are dirt cheap at goodwill at the end of summer, and it's like 98% mineral oil. Second, I use this in a Park Tool on-bike chain cleaner (cheap copies now on amazon), that saves a lot of effort of pulling the chain off and putting back on. I put in some solvent, put it on the chain, crank the chain through a couple full revolutions, then leave the cleaner on and walk away for a while, let the solvent do its magic, then crank more and pull off the cleaner. I wipe the chain dry, and could immediately lube, but I usually do this on a rainy day so often let it sit overnight for most of the remaining mineral oil in the chain to evaporate, then lube chain.

I used to lube chain with melted wax (for over a decade), liked the clean of it, went to oil because I thought it lubed better. Test results online now prove opposite, wax works great, even plain ol candle wax, however mixtures with teflon powder and molybdenum- or tungsten-disulfide are even better; Expensive, but you can also mix your own with purchased ingredients. However, wax does not protect against rust, that was also a reason for me switching to oil, but I now avoid rain like the plague because the road grit trashes the drivetrain and rim brakes, plus gets inside my cheap hubs and pedal bearings, so basically a complete overhaul after a good soaking on the road. So I expect this year to go back to wax after buying a couple new chains and a new cassette. Melted wax requires pulling the chain off, but that's a lot easier when it is clean. And, the derailleur pulleys, cogs, and chainrings don't get full of oil-crud.

Biker Pete 

I switched to immersive hot wax. No black mess on the drivetrain any more. I’m 100% sold. Before wax, I was pretty anal about drivetrain maintenance and cleanliness and still, as the OP has noted, the black mess returned very quickly.

Kai Winters

You can clean the drivetrain until it glistens but after adding a lubricant, and cleaning off the residue, you will still have a coated system after one ride and will have black fingers if you run them over the chain, etc.
The lubricant will move about as the drivetrain is in motion so much of it will wind up outside the pins, etc. of the chain and will be transferred to the rear der. pulleys, chain rings, etc. as you ride. It can't be helped. You can wipe down the drivetrain post ride, just with a cloth, etc. and not add more lube. This will result in less ick after the next ride but it will still be there and you can't get rid of it.
You will just have to live with it as many have done for decades as it is part of the oil based lube process or eliminate it by going to an oil less based lube...immersion waxing, drip wax, etc.

As has been said, WD-40 is not a lubricant it is a 'water dispersant' thus the 'WD'. Use a proper lubricant for moving parts and wipe off the excess.

smd4

Maybe for you. This has never been my experience.

grumpus

Sounds like you're not cleaning the chain internals, so as soon as you oil it and ride it some of the residue is floating out on the clean oil. My chain cleaning routine: remove, soak and shake in a jar of kerosene, let it drip for a while then wash violently in hot soapy water, rinse and hang on a heat source to dry thoroughly before refitting. Finally lubricate with Finish Line Wet - I like to do this while the chain is still hot. This way a silver chain will stay silver for a week (more in summer, less in winter). You can reuse the kerosene, just decant into another jar once the dirt has settled to the bottom.

Kai Winters

unlikely but meh, don't really care...

SoSmellyAir

howaboutme: Just go to your local Home Depot and buy OMS:

Klean-Strip 1 qt. Odorless Mineral Spirits QKSP94005 - The Home Depot

Wipe the outside of the chain clean, submerge in OMS within a clean pasta sauce jar, and agitate for a minute. Repeat a few times. Then submerge the chain in a second bath (i.e., another jar of OMS), and do the same thing. Chain comes out spotless. Air dry (if you are in warm and dry climate) or wipe dry (if you are in a cold and wet climate).

Wear nitrile gloves during the entire process.

KerryIrons

You probably are not wiping the chain enough after you apply the lube. You should wipe until your rag pretty much comes off clean. The lube is only needed inside the rollers and pins, Lube on the outside of the chain just serves as a dirt magnet.

Duragrouch

Unless the chain gets contaminated with a lot of outside dirt (like riding in sandy or muddy conditions), the majority of the black contaminant in the cleaning solvent is very, very fine metal particles from the chain. These disperse in the chain lube to form a colloid, which makes the lube more pasty, plus also acts as an abrasive. You can find proof of this by dipping a magnet into the used cleaning solvent, it will emerge covered in sludge, and sand and dirt are silica and organic matter, not ferromagnetic. This is why the lubricating oil gets black so quickly after cleaning, no way to avoid that, I only clean my chain when the level of contamination makes the lube thick and pasty. That's with liquid lube.

Melted wax, on the other hand, one that is hard at room temperature, tends to not hold metal contaminants; Either the wax keeps the metal parts separated, or when the wax wears through and you get metal-to-metal contact, the fine metal powder seems to self-shed by gravity into the environment, without sticking to the wax. When you rewax the chain, you will see very little contaminents, a bit over time, but nothing like with liquid lubes. You can even remove the contaminants from the wax by melting it with some water present (added before heating up, not added to hot wax), the wax will float over the water, leaving behind the contaminants in the water after the wax cools, according to someone on the forum (I have not yet tried, I do have an old puck of candle wax with a small amount of metal on the bottom, after like a decade of use).

howaboutme

Thanks everyone for your advice. I'll get my routine down soon enough.

By the way, what do you all do w/ the dirty towels used to clean the chain? Do you throw it away or wash it?