So I’ve spent the last couple of days working on some real old bikes that haven’t seen a clean in what appears to be decades.

What does everyone use to get good clean hands other than soap? the oily mechanic hands look is annoying me.

Tested so far a has been a mixture of soap, fairy liquid and turps (had it laying around) with mixed results…

Swarfega.

MTFU in a pot.

Swarfega

Orange ‘flavour’ in a hand pump

Swarfega does the trick nicely. Just got some a month or two ago and can’t believe I didn’t get it sooner.

Fairy Liquid and granulated sugar. Cheap version of swarfega, but does the job just as well, with the advantage that the sugar dissolves in warm water, so cleaning the sink doesn’t take as long. Just try not to leave oily fingerprints all over the bag of sugar…

Or Crabtree & Evelyn Gardener’s Hand Scrub if you’re posh. Same effect but leaves bits of grit all over the sink.

Cheap and less effective version of swarfega

Original green swarfega does its job extremely well without abrasive (the orange one has grit in it though). And it isnt remotely like fairy liquid.

As stealthcat, granulated sugar or salt will do the job nicely.

My commuter gets really manky over the winter, with a nice mix of oil, road grime and ‘dust’ off the brake pads. I found sugar and washing up liquid to be quite effective.

washing up liquid with a small hand of sugar to work it into your skin.

Fairy Liquid and granulated sugar.

Ditto. Works brilliantly, and much more environmentally friendly than Swarfega (and shitloads cheaper too).

Make up a mixture before mechanicking, to prevent oily sugar jar.

lol – apparently sugar and washing up liquid makes you all post at once 🙂

Will artificial sweetener work?

Thanks all…

[goes off to raid the baking cupboard]

Fairy liquid & sand works far better than with sugar tbh…..
For a real MTFU hand cleaner,use fairly liquid & washing powder.Probably not the best choice if you have “girly-hands”….

FFS, if you want to MTFU properly why not just use an angle grinder eh?

rub clean oil in wipe off then wash with washing up liquid if you havent got any swarfega

Dip in petrol, light.

start with some normal cooking oil,
this thins it out,
then use washing up liquid and hot water.

i’ve recently started using wd40 to start with and then swarfega this seems to work aswell,

but you’ll never get it out of your nails,

Spray GT85. Inhale.

you could just use some latex nitrile gloves when working on your bike, save washing you hands 20 times a day when you remeber something else you need from the house.

Otherwise yes “Fairy Liquid and granulated sugar. Cheap and effective version of swarfega”

but you’ll never get it out of your nails,

Nailbrush…

I have a pot of orange stuff from Halfords that was not criminally expensive and claims to be biodegradable. But I quite like having mechanic hands at the weekend.

?????

Just dab a bit of white spirit on your hands, rub. It all comes off. And as most people use white spirit to clean their bikes, you probably have some handy.

Washing powder does a good job if my hands are really greasy.

brake cleaner does a good job … as does fenwicks…as does tf2 …

swarfega does the job too mind once i procured a large tub tht didnt run out all the time (was using 500gram tubs)

I’ve always been shocked at just how effective baby wipes are – always keep them in the car, garage, etc.

next time:

The orange swarfega will shift anything, realistically bike muck tends not to be too horrible mind (apart from neglected chains, ew) so it’s slight overkill. The stuff they sell in Morrisons, “The Really Good Stuff”, also works well and it’s dirt cheap (it’s a slight abrasive, and lots of citrus to dissolve the oil)

Fairy liquid and sugar does work, but not anything like as well.

I’ve always been shocked at just how effective baby wipes are – always keep them in the car, garage, etc.

I’ll second the baby wipe option.
Brilliant at cleaning hands – if they can get clagged on baby poop off skin, then they’ll shift anything!