[Closed] Alternatives to muc off?

Mucoff is evil! It'll strip grease from hubs etc, use a gentler cleaner, I use a great product called Bicyclean (pants name but it works). A lot of people swear by Fenwicks too (cheaper if you buy a big container). Or Caravan cleaner : )

Are there any cheap versions?

Mix it 50/50 with water. Boom! Half price!

Personally I use Fenwicks.

fenwicks here too, also found that it cleans and shines an anodized frame better than muc off

Fenwicks.

Anyone know if the caravan cleaner the same stuff as the bike cleaner? Caravan stuff is available in a much bigger bottle

Edit: Can't find big bottles of the caravan cleaner anymore, but can find big bottles of bike cleaner. Strange.

Fenwicks, Brilliant stuff

+1 for Fenwicks. Get the 1ltr FS-1 for 9.99 and it dilute 1-10 (FS-1-Water) and presto you have 10ltrs for 10 quid. Works well, safe on bearings, brakes etc... Sorted.

Hope Sh1t Sh1fter although I'll only use stuff like that when the bike is truly filthy, most stuff like that strips grease from hubs and bearings very quickly.

Fenwicks is very good too - only reason I use the Hope stuff is cos it's what the LBS stocks.

Bucket of hot water, capful of car shampoo and a brush shifts all the muck without wrecking your bearings.

A solution of biological washing powder/liquid and baking soda does the trick for me.

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Sodium bicarbonate

"A paste from baking soda can be very effective when used in cleaning and scrubbing.[18] For cleaning aluminium objects, the use of sodium bicarbonate is discouraged as it attacks the thin unreactive protective oxide layer of this otherwise very reactive metal."

Only a small amount required, helps get those enzymes rocking and rolling

5 mins cleaning as opposed to half hour!"

<eddie murphy voice> Get the Fick Out of Here ! </eddie murphy voice>

I use Turtle Wax car shampoo with a bucket and brush. Works well and I'm still on a 5 litre tub I bought about 4 yrs ago, only need a tiny bit.

I have been using car shampoo but I think most now come with a wax additive which is great for cars but on a bike I wonder if brake pads + wax is a sensible combo - does anyone know if the wax does have an adverse effect?

I use Fairy liquid and warm water with a what can only be described as an Afro hand thingy??

Is Fairy Liquid a big no no? Am i gonna get flamed here?

+ 1 here for car wash/wax in a bucket with a brush/sponge with hose to rinse.

I have been using Dirt Juice

Very good and also top Value when you buy the twin pack with "super gnarl" which is undiluted

Smells great and does what it says on the tin....erm bottle

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Fenwicks is good. Have two trigger thingies, one 10% and the other at 30% for the drivetrain

my local bike shop has another name for muc off, but then id be swearing if i said it out loud ... 😉

I also use a product called Autosmart G101 on the chain and real grease busting jobs

It is amazing. Brand new chain shine in 2 mins!

Also great for loads of round the home/car applications

You can get it from Industrial supplies for around £6/5L which dilutes 1/10

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Fairy liquid here, been using it for decades on motorcycles & mountain bikes.

TFR? (Traffic Film Remover)

Bought five litres of the stuff for the car, and it's good for the bike too. Probably quite caustic so don't use it generously, and water it way down. Cheap as chips.

Mucoff is evil! It'll strip grease from hubs etc

how does it get in?

I use autoglym bike cleaner, purely because I get samples 😉 to test
Seems to do a grand job, I'd just use washing up liquid if I didn't have it though

+1 for fenwicks concentrate FS1, then dilute to 10% solution. I bought a 5L tub of the concentrate as I also use it as a pre-wash spray on my motorbikes-very good for shifting bug splats, chain lube etc.

Have heard numerous times that muc off and fenwicks are re-packaged caravan cleaner at a mark-up, and that G101 of Kbrembos is probably something similar.

I use car shampoo for the actual wash, washing-up liquid goes nowhere near my bikes (pedal or motor). Most of them use reactive salts which are great for causing corrosion.

G101 is non Caustic

Fairy liquid here, keeps my hands soft, innit.

Fairy Liquid and other dish cleaners have quite a lot of common salt in them (approx 5%). They also have other stuff that will perish rubber. The combination means that salt water may get into your bearings and knacker them. I have knackered two headsets washing my bike in fairy, I'd never use the stuff again, not for bikes, not for cars.

I buy Fenwicks FS1, 5 litre container.

Mixed at 15/1 ratio with water. Awesome clear, 5 litres concentrate makes 75 litres, which lasts me over a year at a time. Great value for money.

Alkalis break down the oxide layer on aluminium which allows oxidisation.

Fairy liquid (10% solution) ph 9.0 so it's an alkali.

G101 traffic film remover (concentrate) ph 13

I wonder if muc off fares any better
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[url= http://www.finesse-products.co.uk/home.htm ]Finesse Products.[/url] There's a whole range of other products as well as the multi clean.

Just done Ph test with muc off and got a reading of 11.3.

IPA on the chain, mechs and disks.

Brush and Stardrops on the frame.

abductee - Member

Alkalis break down the oxide layer on aluminium which allows oxidisation.

Fairy liquid (10% solution) ph 9.0 so it's an alkali.

G101 traffic film remover (concentrate) ph 13

I wonder if muc off fares any better

This is all pretty much irrelevant for the purposes of washing your bike
Who the hell would use a 10% concentration of Fairy liquid to wash their bike, or any thing else really?
& then doesn't rinse it off?

None of the products mentioned in this thread are going to do any harm whatsoever to your bike, unless you want to dip them in a tank of it for a few weeks

None of the products mentioned in this thread are going to do any harm whatsoever to your bike, unless you want to dip them in a tank of it for a few weeks

That is clearly not true.

Try this - add a tablespoon of salt to a bucket of water, and wash your bike with it. It will rust bearings etc if it gets into them, and rinsing doesn't help much once it is in.

Also, washing up liquid is crap for disc brakes as well, it messes up the pads / rotors surfaces and make them squeak / not work correctly.

Why cheap out and use something inappropriate to save a few pennies on a thousand pound bike?

TBH, you are better washing with plain water than using washing up detergent. It gets the bike almost as clean, and is less likely to mess things up.

But - your money, your choice. Just remind me not to buy a used bike or car from you 🙂

Also, washing up liquid is crap for disc brakes as well, it messes up the pads / rotors surfaces and make them squeak / not work correctly.

Why cheap out and use something inappropriate to save a few pennies on a thousand pound bike?

TBH, you are better washing with plain water than using washing up detergent. It gets the bike almost as clean, and is less likely to mess things up.

But - your money, your choice. Just remind me not to buy a used bike or car from you

Well,

I've got an old road bike in the workshop that's been washed with washing up liquid regularly for the last 30 years or so
Hang on, I'll just go check ............

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No, it's not rusted away to nothing yet.
You had me worried then, I was expecting to open the garage door & find nothing but a pile of dust

bucket of warm water with some soap flakes in it.

Eco-friendly washing up liquid (I use Sainsbury's own "Eco Home) in lots of hot water. One microfibre cloth to scrub (the cloth cleans well on it's own anyway) and another to dry the bike. The cloths are handy for flossing the linkages and getting right in around the nooks n crannies.

No residues, nice on the things in our water system and cheap too. Keeping the bike clean means scrubbing is restricted to fresh mud which comes off pretty easy.

Been using Pedros green fizz for the last 12 months with good results but I do spend too long cleaning and polishing.

Once saw a set of Fox ATV shocks that had been cleaned with neat truck wash, it had dissolved the stickers and virtually all the anodising off the body tubes and adjusters.
The owner of the quad had given it to his saturday boy to clean 😯

I used to jetwash clean cones that were used on motorways, using traffic film remover (truckwash). It was really nasty stuff, your skin would fall off if you handled it neat.

[i]Also, washing up liquid is crap for disc brakes as well, it messes up the pads / rotors surfaces and make them squeak / not work correctly.[/i]

this is bollards, sorry. I've used nothing but washing up liquid on my bikes since forever, and my brakes a re fine as are my rotors, nothing squeaks or leaks or anything...

As you may have seen I'm working on formulating a new bike cleaner - just taken it out of lab now (9 iterations) for real world testing. Test samples have gone out to a few people. In the lab its performed better than competitor products so fingers crossed.

You can read a little about it and keep up to date

http://dirtwork.posterous.com/

To add to previous comments, I wouldn't use TFR on my bike, too caustic. I wouldn't use washing up liquid either due to the salt - won't rust your bike away but won't help bearings and steel cavities it finds its way into.

And for those mentioning about buying repackaged carvan cleaner I should add my Dirt Work is formulated from scratch, for a bike, by chemists!

I've got an old road bike in the workshop that's been washed with washing up liquid regularly for the last 30 years or so
Hang on, I'll just go check .

No, it's not rusted away to nothing yet.
You had me worried then, I was expecting to open the garage door find nothing but a pile of dust

washing up liquid is crap for disc brakes as well, it messes up the pads / rotors surfaces and make them squeak / not work correctly.

this is bollards, sorry. I've used nothing but washing up liquid on my bikes since forever, and my brakes a re fine as are my rotors, nothing squeaks or leaks or anything...

It doesn't matter, this isn't something that can be resolved on the internets. You guys experience is obviously different to mine, and that is fine. My recent experience has pointed to washing up liquid screwing up my headset twice, and also messing up my disc breaks (maybe it is the pads? I dunno). Thinking about it for more than 0.005 seconds, it is not the right application for it (otherwise fairy would just squirt a bit into some water and sell it in bikeshops for £10 a litre), and I ain't going to argue with anyone who thinks that salt water + bare steel is a good idea.