The need for speed
A primer on how to keep your road bike chains shiny!
I purchased my first road bike, Fuji Sportif 1.5, back in 2003. Since then, I would have ridden hundreds of kilometers. I have been fortunate to reside next to the ORR (Outer Ring Road) which provides great opportunities to venture into the outskirts of the city. The city lanes are wide, and the morning wee hours suit me best with barely any risky traffic to negotiate. With time I could feel the pedaling wasn’t as smooth as before. Usual research through YouTube videos led to Do-It-Yourself guides on biking cleaning. I found taking the bike to a repair shop quite cumbersome, hence thought of learning the tricks myself. Here was my DYI attempt at keeping the wheels dirt free.
If you are a beginner, it takes anywhere between 1-3 hours for this weekend exercise, depending on whether you are disassembling the wheels or not. In the initial years, I was hesitant to tinker around with the wheel configuration for the fear of not being able to realign it back perfectly. All you then need is a bike chain cleaner tool and a pair of bike chain cleaner and lubricant lube. These are easily available in Amazon online store.
The cleaner box tool is quite intuitive to use. The inside of it has multiple layers of brushes of different dimensions and shapes. All you would need to do is open the top cover and fit the chain inside it, and lock in the cover again. The handle works both for locking purposes as well as holding the cleaner as you rotate the pedals to move the chain through the brushes. There are 2 lubes, one for degreasing the chains that will remove all the oil so that it can then be subsequently cleaned up easily using soap water. The other one is a lubricant to apply to the chain links post cleaning. Apply the degreasing lube first on the chain, and use the chain brush tool to remove the oil. Use a sponge with soap and water to wipe off the dirt from the chain. And finally, apply the lubricant. You can also clean up the bike cassette by using the degreasing spray, and in a similar manner cleaning through soap water and lubricating it back. Note though, that it is hard to reach into all deep areas of the cassette when the rear wheel is still fitted to the chains.
If you wish to go the extra mile, dismantling the wheels is a better option to get deeper cleaning done, specifically to clean the cassette. It wasn’t as tough as I initially found it intimidating. The road bikes come with levers that when flipped open, can easily pull out the wheel. For my bike, I did not require any additional toolkits to unscrew anything. This was more fun. I just popped out the rear wheel and the cassette was much more accessible for cleaning.
Fun Fact: I took a click of the chain configuration attached to the rear wheel before dismantling it so that I do not mess up with the refitting at the end.
I used the same degreaser, soap water, and lubricant technique to get the result and shiny cassette which looked as good as new.
Few things I learned to be aware of. For one, the cassette spikes are sharp. Watch your hands when you are over-enthusiastically rubbing off the dirt with the sponge. I have had a few deep ugly cuts in the past. Secondly, do not over-lubricate the chains. One might think the more the lubricant, the smoother the chains will perform, but the downside is that over a couple of subsequent bike rides it will simply stick in a pile of dust quickly. So always remember to wipe out the extra lubricant at the end.