As we enter the peak mud-biking season I’m already getting peed-off with clay/organic material sticking too/staining the surfaces of my cycles. Not that I’m prissy or anything its just that when I have rinsed off or god fobid even washed the thing properly once it has dried the film of off-road grime still lingers and provides a key for the next coating to stick even better a few days later.

I am currently contemplating wiping the thing over with a gt85 dampened rag in the hope that the oily-teflon film will sort of make it a bit more non-stick.

Ayone got any brighter ideas excluding lard/butter/castrol gtx/wd40/tingle/ky jelly/ or anything else of a purely humourous or fly attracting nature.

TF2 works for me.

Mr Sheen?

Try some back to black silicon cleaner, slippy as anything but keep it well away from brakes

Mr Sheen is that a suggestion or the voice of experience speaking?

Juice fork lube,spray your frame with it.

Mr Sheen works. Silicon spray is good too, lasts longer than GT85 etc. Some people swear by car polish then wax but that sounds like a lot of hard work to me…

maguiers carnuba wax is great for making a anti stick surface always do 2 coats on a frame before i build it and then tf2 after evry wash.

cling film

Titanium, the raw metal frames seem particularly good in respect of cleaning off very easily; not that it’s much help for a treatment on a current frame, more a consideration for the future.

I’d look at one of the polymer or resin waxes that affect (limit) the way that water adheres to the frames… lot of stuff about contact angles and ionic bonding, just repels water in essence. Some are more durable than others; the ‘Auto Glym Super Resin’ wax seems reasonable on cars, although it’s an empirical finding that laterally splattered cow shit still sticks determinedly.
Just ride/ drive round the front of any cows; hope that helps.

I’m sure I read somewhere that over the pond they spray their bikes with Pam. It’s an aerosol cooking oil. Cheap enough to reuse every ride and comes off with most cleaners.

Brooklyn did a bike with a Teflon coating. Just like a frying pan!

A roadie told me he used turtle wax on his frames, makes things bead and leave the frame more easily. Maybe wax, then lube. Or ‘copter tape and not grease your bike up?

Brooklyn did a bike with a Teflon coating. Just like a frying pan!

I was thinking about this yesterday as I cleaned my bike – why has no-one come up with a Teflon-coated bike frame?!

Finish Line do a bike polish/protectant which is excellent – spray it on (ideally when the bike is in bits, means you can cover the frame in it) and, certainly for the first few rides, mud just brushes straight off it.

Otherwise just cover the vulnerable bits (downtube, back of seat-tube) in GT85 or TF2 and leave it, don’t rub it off. It’ll evaporate and leave a teflon film there.

I believe Gun-Kote will do a similar job,

If you’re spraying TF2 or GT85 on, that’ll soon do for the wax surely? They’re all basically white spirit in a can with some other stuff mixed in.

Right, I have just coated one half of my bike RH side with pledge multi-surface polish inc RH fork legs, rims and tyre side walls. The left hand side has been similarly done with gt85. So one side is wax film coated and the other teflon, monday nights ride is usually pretty gloopy so it will be ridden and cleaned in the name of science. Empiracyclical results will be posted back in due course.

why has no-one come up with a Teflon-coated bike frame?

How would they get the teflon coat to stick to the frame?

why not just wash your bike after each ride ?

or just brush the dried mud off?

Cos after I’ve washed it it’s still got a fine film of ingrained crap on it that acts as a key for the next batch of filth. This was not an issue when I was in scotland a couple of weeks ago so I guess its related to the type of goo encountered in the clwyds and my local forest which contains a lot of decomposed organic stuff which stains like tea.

In other words it would be nice if the stuff didn’t stick as easily as it does then I can rinse it off better post ride before it sets.

Pseudo scientific test completed and the side treated with ‘Pledge’ furniture polish worked a treat the other side gt85 coated was pants. I could even see the difference whilst out as far less mud stuck to the pledge side. When I got back to base and hosed the bike down the pledge side was gleamingly clean with no stains at all, the other side was the same as usual with a film of grime still present after all the loose mud had been hosed off.

Pledge furniture polish is a clear winner, don’t know whether other makes will work as well or better but as its err-indoors polish it cost nowt.

I give my frame a good polish with (Autoglym) car wax every so often

A quick rinse off straight after a ride & the cack that does stick to the frame disappears leaving an almost spotless bike.

Dodo Juice Red Mist. Designed for cars primarily, but unlike natural waxes (wuch as Megs and Autoglym) which wear off quickly, its synthetic so sets much better and bonds to the surface. Very slippy stuff, makes water bead lovely (read run off). Compared to Megs/AutoGlym its well worth the money. Give it a couple of layers and off you go.

For car lovers, swap megs/AG for Dodo Supernatural wax. Expensive, but well worth it 😀 AG SRP is flawed in that it is a polish and sealant in one, I dont see how that works very well, one removes paint, the other protects it?! It does work well as a polish, but I’d never leave paint with just that on it, always wax and/or sealant applied afterwards.

Didn’t Marin have teflon paint ages ago?

I used to worry about this with moderate success then I realised that the only bits you can coat with slippery stuff are the frame tubes which are super easy to clean. The fiddly bits either a) are lubed already in the case of drivetrain etc or b) must be kept free from lube ie brakes.

So it wasn’t worth worrying about 🙂