Cleaning the uncleanable

rymus

After an autumn of "every so often" cleaning and a winter of "ahh I'll do it tomorrow" cleaning, my bike has become encrusted with every possible type of filth it's possible to pick up on Irish roads. Theres your standard mud, the mud that won't come off easily, the mud that is carbon bonded to the paint & chrome and of course the dreaded road tar thats permenantly welded itself to practically every square inch of chrome it could find. Theres surface rust and one particularly bad spot on the rear fender that's probably going to need an intervention to sort out. I want it all gone!

Summers coming and it's time to have a squeaky clean bike. I have your standard solutions & tools. Auto Glym tar remover, paint restorer, chrome polish and that big squirty bottle of motorbike washing stuff. I am considering buying some kind of industrial strength buffing contraption to hopefully give me back my mirror finish chrome or at least remove some of the more stubborn tar & mud. At present I haven't got a bloody clue what kind of buffer to buy, I even went as far as to consider buying a dremel, because it's small and will be able to get into the pokey areas and it comes with a polishing attachment. I know if I do this manually it's going to take at least 7 months to get the thing looking presentable. I should post up some pics so you can see what I'm talking about, in fact I may do that later.

Any ideas welcomed.

seamus

I did something similar a few weeks ago, but not as extreme. A big can of spray degreaser, a big basin of hot water, and a plastic wool shammy. The shammy is like taking a brillo pad to the bike, but it won't scratch the chrome. Although, I didn't scrub too hard on the painted bits

Allegedly, a good cure for rust is Coca-cola and using crumpled up tinfoil to scrub it. Although, I was recommended to substitute the coke for WD40, which sounds more likely

rymus

cheers seamus, I'm gonna get one of those plastic wool thingys.. I presume the one youre on about is the kinda thing youd get in any supermarket? I've never seen one in a bike shop anyway...

Bit worried about taking tinfoil to the rust though. Is the tinfoil supposed to be a sacrificial metal or something? (no, I can't remember a whole lot from leaving cert engineering).

sceptre

I used to find vaseline quite good for getting rust off my push bike quite a few moons ago. No scientific facts or basis for this, just observation so it might have been as simple as lubricating the rust off for all I know. Seemed to work a treat though.

robertob

something like this might help?

I'd be cautious about using "industrial cleaners" might take paint as well as gunk.
Have a vague recollection of a product called "Gunk off" or "degunk". Motor factors would be a place to try.

seamus

Originally posted by rymus
cheers seamus, I'm gonna get one of those plastic wool thingys.. I presume the one youre on about is the kinda thing youd get in any supermarket? I've never seen one in a bike shop anyway...

Yeah, twould with all the household stuff. It gets all greasy and stuff afterwards, rendering it quite unusable again, but they're only about €3 anyway.