Used IPA in the past, somebody suggested Mineralised Methylated Spirits but they contain:

 (b) in the case of mineralised methylated spirits, with every 90 parts by volume of spirits there shall be mixed 9.5 parts by volume of wood naphtha and 0.5 parts by volume of crude pyridine, and to the resulting mixture there shall be added mineral naphtha (petroleum oil) in the proportion 7.5 litres to every 2,000 litres of the mixture and synthetic organic dyestuff (methyl violet) in the proportion 3.0 grammes to every 2,000 litres of the mixture;

doesn't sound like it could be used – petroleum oil?

Meths is fine

after all it's only a bicycle, not the space shuttle 🙂

Soap & hot water is also very good

I put my rotors in the dish washer.

Disk brake cleaner from the local car spares place. Does the job and gets you high if used liberaly indoors. 😀

Don't do it unless the disc is contaminated. Don't use anything with any residue. Discs have a microscopic layer of pad material deposited on them and you don't want to clean it off if you want your brake to work properly.

ive never cleaned a rotor! cloth to wipe the dry dirt of the alloy spider after a hose. when i brake the pads clean the rotor!

I've used meths and surgical spirit before thinkin they'd be fine but i'm pretty sure there not: had to change the pads shortly afterwards!

I use car disc brake cleaner now which is potent 😯 but does the job nicely 😀

I can have a look at the tin and find out exactly what it is if ya want…

what TandemJeremy said – i only clean the rotors with soapy water and a brush. if you inadvertantly spray chin lube/wd40 on them they should be cleaned with a fast evaporating solvent – meths isn't perfect for this but will be ok..

i`ve never ever cleaned a rotor either!
aerosol disk brake cleaner from the local car spares place IS the stuff to use,
but don't do it unless the disc is contaminated with chain lube etc

why do you feel the need to clean them?

…and definitely *not* white spirit, it'll leave a deposit.

wet mud, or IPA – whichever's closest to hand (and a bit on whether there's oily kak on the rotor)

Does India Pale Ale really work? 😕

Hope use meths and not for drinking !

IPA occasionally.

Blow torch

Reluctant – Member
Does India Pale Ale really work?

course! – sit in the garage & drink some, then realise the discs are largely self-cleaning

a customer came in complaining about brake problems. She'd been 'cleaning' her disks with lemon peel of all things. 😯

Disk brake cleaner from the local car spares place. Does the job and gets you high if used liberaly indoors.

Read that's a bad idea: car disc cleaner contains a rust inhibitor that stays on the disc after cleaning. This is quickly burned off with the pressure/heat of car pads but it's a bit different on a bike where it will take a lot longer to disappear and will impair braking.

Not all disc brake cleaners contain a residue / lube / rust inhibitor – some do and some dont

Cheers 🙂
Never actually felt the need to clean the discs on a car or read the can of cleaner!

Just water for me. Or a bit of Cannock Chase spray.

big tin of xylene-the stuff that makes marker pens smell so good, cleans discs well when I end up squirting everywhere..

gin

Full fat coka cola will degrees anything. then rinse with H2o

Halfords sell their own brand 'electrical contact cleaner', it's a solvent based degreaser so it blasts away any grease then evaporates. It's £3.99 for a 400ml can so it's significantly cheaper than the disc-brake cleaners.

Automotive disc brake cleaner, sprayed on wet parts gently brush in and wash off.
I do that after almost every ride. It also cleans the cassette and mech as well as removing the residue around the pads.
It also seems to make the parts last longer. Then again I'm a bit OCD and like to ride a well kept and clean bike everytime.

When I used to have Hope brakes, they seemed to be very fickle about even a small amount of contamination on them.

An LBS mechanic told me to take the disc off, douse it in meths, and set it alight. Twice.

This really does work. Well, it did for me. 🙂

I stopped cleaning mine with anything apart from water ages ago, and if anything my brakes have worked better since.

Soapy water when I wash the bike. Miraculously I'm still alive

A good one to try I would have thought would be nail varnish remover.
It's basically acetone and leaves no residue.

its basicly acetone, well 90% acetone, the other 10% is the nice smelling residue, best avoided.

soapy water here, or if they've been left in a tool box for a while, the dish washer. Got some car wheel cleaner which was 99p from somewhere and does a good job of getting rid of cak arround the dereilieurs/chainstay etc.

I normally would clean the discs with soemthing smelly between pad changes or after a ham fisted bleeding session 😉 Soapy water at all other times. Thanks for the advice.