As a mechanic for the last 20+ years, I'll add my two cents here. Park chain cleaner boxes are a hot mess, and degreaser is bad. We don't even have degreaser in the shop. I just keep it around the house to clean up bacon splatters and grease stains on my pants.
Here's a write up from our site on prolink, but it talks about cleaning a chain, how to do it, how to relube, with no box, minimal mess, no premature drivetrain wear: *Chain lube should keep your chain lubed, not looking nice. Clean lubes are giving something up to be clean. Maybe it’s the need to apply to a completely clean chain, maybe they don’t protect against rust as well, but there is no free lunch. Clean lubes are not as effective at protecting your chain as greasy gross wet lubes. Is the ball joint of your car clean? Heck no, it’s horrible, covered in a goopy mess of black grease. You don’t see them using ‘clean’ or clear grease in there.* *Prolink makes a good really thin chain lube. It’s like WD-40, but for bikes. WD-40 has a whole bunch of solvents in it. These help break down rust and flush out thicker lubes. When the solvents dry, there is a bit of lube in the WD-40. Not enough to actually do a good job lubing a chain, but enough to keep a door hinge swinging freely. Prolink is similar, but it has a higher lube content. Still a ton of solvents, but more lube. That means Prolink is a great lube to clean your chain with. What??!* *Cleaning your chain with degreaser is bonkers. If the degreaser is strong enough to break down the old chain lube, guess what, it’s strong enough to keep the fresh stuff from getting in. Sure, you can flush the chain with water, after degreasing it, then use a combo of time and an air compressor to blow the water out of the chain. Me, I don’t like to use an air compressor on a chain. Not only is it hard on our generator, but it also flings black water all over the place, including but not limited such places as your rims, tan sidewalls and disc rotors. Just air drying a chain could take over a day. I don’t have time for that. I have firewood to process. If you clean your chain with prolink, you flush two things outta the chain: grit (composed of road grit and bits of your chain) and old lube. * *Continue on for more True Facts about Chain Lube:* *Analog’s Cardinal Rules of Chain Lube:* - *Chain lube (or anything really) should NOT have PTFE in it. Why not? It’s exceptionally bad for the environment. <https://www.nytimes.com/2016/01/10/magazine/the-lawyer-who-became-duponts-worst-nightmare.html> Actually it’s inordinately bad for everything. * - *Chain lube should not cost an arm and a leg. Even our favorite lubes really, should be cheaper. I wish we found a cheap, good, bio lube that we could sell. But as it is, the two lubes we offer are pretty cheap, in the scheme of things.* - *Chain lube shouldn’t have wax in it. It clumps, esp in cold weather. * - *Chain lube should keep your chain lubed, not looking nice. Clean lubes are giving something up to be clean. Maybe it’s the need to apply to a completely clean chain, maybe they don’t protect against rust as well, but there is no free lunch. Clean lubes are not as effective at protecting your chain as greasy gross wet lubes. Is the ball joint of your car clean? Heck no, it’s horrible, covered in a goopy mess of black grease. You don’t see them using ‘clean’ or clear grease in there.* - *Chain lube should be easy on, and relatively easy off. You shouldn’t have to take your chain off, or scrub your cassette, or take a dental pick to your derailleur pulleys every time you wanna lube your chain. If your chain isn’t horrendously gross looking, you should be able to just add a bit more lube and keep going. If it’s really bad, you should be able to clean it, with a rag, while on the bike. If you can’t, you have the wrong lube.* - *Ideally, chain lube should be sticky enough to last for a few weeks of riding in whatever conditions you like to ride in. So in the winter, your lube should be heavier and stickier, and in the dry of summer, it can be thinner, if it’s not all rainy and muddy out. * - *That’s it. * *The process is super simple: Shift into the big ring up front and the hardest gear in the back. Apply Prolink generously, so that when you stop pedaling, it’s dripping on the floor. Do something else for a few minutes. For instance, buy a water bottle from us. Then mosey back over. The solvent has done its thing. Take a dry T shirt, preferably your roommates, and drag the chain through it, holding the chain very loosely in a bundle of shirt. You can do this on the upper run of chain or the lower. I don’t care, just don’t get your fingers caught in the chainrings. Pedal backward. Keep flipping the shirt to a fresh spot of cotton and keep wiping. Do this routine until the chain is coated and wet looking but not black with oil. If you are riding in nice dry weather, boom, that’s it, you are done. If you are riding in the rain, or mud, or snow, etc, you are not done. Leave the chain alone and go buy a hat from us. When you come back in five minutes, most of the solvents will have evaporated out. You can skip this step if you are in a hurry.* *Now, grab your other bottle of lube, Finish Line’s wet chain lube (Phil’s oil also works fine but it’s double the cost with no noticeable benefit) and apply a thin stream of that to the chain. Get it fully coated, but you don’t need a gallon of the stuff. Just make sure the rollers and side plates are covered with a thin layer. Wipe off the excess, good to go.* *Prolink is the only lube I have used that pulls bits of metal out of the chain’s rollers. The chain gets grit in the rollers, and that grit acts like sand paper and wears the chain down. The little bits of metal that flake off further wear the chain down. Removing those is muy bueno. Prolink does that. Finish line wet lube is just a cheap, goopy lube that keeps the chain running quietly and does well with wet weather. It’s sticky and dark green and gross, which are all good traits in a heavy duty bad conditions lube. It comes off easily with Prolink. Reapply when the chain is either noisy, has some surface rust, or because you are about to go on a big bike trip. Clean it with Prolink a few times a year, or when it’s really mucked up and gross.* *Now go throw out that silly chain cleaner, and use that Simple Green on what it was intended for: pizza stains on your favorite concert Tee. Actually, use Miracle Red for that, it’s better. * - James / Analog Cycles / Tanglefoot Cycles / Fifth Season Canvas / Discord Components On Sunday, October 4, 2020 at 12:01:30 AM UTC-4 Joel S wrote: > Thanks Ray. I ordered some the other day but always good to get another > endorsement. > > Joel > On Sat, Oct 3, 2020 at 6:10 PM Ray Varella <rayvar...@gmail.com> wrote: > >> >> I also use simple green. >> I use diesel fuel for my parts cleaning. I find it works very well as a >> solvent and even if you leave it uncovered, the evaporation rate is >> extremely slow. >> >> Back to simple green, you can adjust the ratio of cleaner to water if you >> buy the concentrate. >> >> Here’s my endorsement: I drive rigs and occasionally someone will drag >> the air lines and power cord across the 5th wheel skid plate. >> These skid plates are covered with the thickest, dirtiest most tenacious >> grease you’ve ever gotten on yourself. >> A couple applications of simple green and a shop rag will wipe away a >> thick coating of this greasy mess. >> No part on any bicycle will ever accumulate this sort of grease. >> It’s also safe to use on many other household chores. >> >> Ray >> On Thursday, October 1, 2020 at 10:38:24 AM UTC-7, Joel S wrote: >>> >>> I used the finish line product but it goes very fast, then greased with >>> finis line. Have hear talk of using a citrus based product. Will use with >>> the park chain cleaning tank. Any recommendations? >>> >>> Thank you >>> >>> Joel >>> >> >> >> >> >> >> >> >> >> -- >> >> >> You received this message because you are subscribed to a topic in the >> Google Groups "RBW Owners Bunch" group. >> >> >> To unsubscribe from this topic, visit >> https://groups.google.com/d/topic/rbw-owners-bunch/W--0htIVlqg/unsubscribe >> . >> >> >> To unsubscribe from this group and all its topics, send an email to >> rbw-owners-bun...@googlegroups.com. >> >> >> To view this discussion on the web visit >> https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/rbw-owners-bunch/745e64af-b684-411c-8748-87733548fb64o%40googlegroups.com >> >> <https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/rbw-owners-bunch/745e64af-b684-411c-8748-87733548fb64o%40googlegroups.com?utm_medium=email&utm_source=footer> >> . >> >> >> -- > ~IMPORTANT~ Note to all~~ EMAIL ETIQUETTE > If you forward this email, please highlight and delete the forwarding > history, which includes my email address and maybe others. It is a courtesy > to me and others who may not wish to have their email addresses sent all > over the world. Erasing the history helps prevent Spammers from obtaining > addresses, prevents viruses from being propagated, and limits the > proliferation of spam. Also, please use the “BCC” area instead of “TO” and > “CC” when forwarding to several people at once. > ~~Thank you~~ > -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "RBW Owners Bunch" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to rbw-owners-bunch+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/rbw-owners-bunch/8f627c6b-9d6b-4c05-8942-0a8e319efa96n%40googlegroups.com.
