I have to chime in about not liking gasoline for cleaning bike stuff. I am sure that for aluminums and surface cleaning, it might be OK, but it tends to have some ingredients that eat chains and freewheels so they don't work well any more.
I vote for Citrus solvents! Here's a cool trick. Take a retired and uncool water bottle (Trek?) and put a grungy chain in it with maybe 3 tablespoons of citrus solvent and double the amount of water. Seal the top and shake... You can do this maybe twice and rinse in water and viola!
Dale Brown cycles de ORO, Inc. 1410 Mill Street Greensboro, NC 27408 USA 336-274-5959 http://www.cyclesdeoro.com http://www.classicrendezvous.com Giant, Specialized, Orbea, Bianchi, Felt, Litespeed, Landshark, Colnago, Townie and other exotica. National Bicycle Dealers Association Board member
-----Original Message----- From: Jerome & Elizabeth Moos <jerrymoos@sbcglobal.net> To: Don_Rogers@brown.edu; classicrendezvous@bikelist.org Sent: Tue, 14 Feb 2006 07:13:53 -0800 (PST) Subject: Re: [CR]Re: Cleaning Parts
I used to use kerosene, which is at least less volatile and a little harder to ignite than gasoline. By the way, having been involved in manufacturing both, Mineral Spirits, which is sold in hardware stores as a solvent, is essentially a semi-refined gasoline. It is lower in aromatics, so perhaps a bit less carcenogenic than gasoline, but just as volatile and flammable.
I now generally use citrus degreaser. I prefer concentrated industrial grades. The kind you see in consumer spray bottles is highly diluted, with an emulsifier added to make it more soluable in water. My big reason for switching from kerosene was that I used to have a very large enclosed front porch where I worked on bikes. But my wife objected to the smell of kerosene, so I switched to citrus degreaser to keep peace in the family. She didn't mind the citrus smell.
Regards,
Jerry Moos Big Spring, TX
Don Rogers <turning.pedals@gmail.com> wrote:
On 2/14/06, Earle Young wrote:
> I know we are supposed to remain civil here, but I have to weigh in:
USIN
G
> GASOLINE TO CLEAN PARTS IS REALLY, REALLY STUPID!
Does anyone have thoughts on kerosene instead? I've heard it's just as effective and much safer, but it was a slightly questionable source that I heard that from.
Don Rogers
Rumford, RI