The thread that ties (literally) your drivetrain together is the chain and keeping that bad boy clean is the ticket to miles and miles of happy pedaling. You don’t want to be that guy squeaking it up on your group ride so here are the basics. These instructions are relevant for any type of bicycle with a chain.

Degrease The Chain

Start by degreasing the chain. We recomend a citrus based degreaser like Pedros Oranje Peels Degreaser or a similar degreaser. Coat the chain, cassette, jockey wheels and chainrings with your degreaser of choice and give it a good brushing. you can use a toothbrush or whatever you got laying around. You could use one of those chain cleaner widgets but I’m not sold on their usefulness given how muh of a hassle they are to setup and clean.

Wash Your Bike

Citrus degreaser can leave a residue on your bike and the chain so you do need to wash after using it. Which is fine for the average rider who should clean their chain about as often as they wash their bike. I wash my road bike after about 12 hours of riding unless there is rain. I wash my mountain bike after every 4 hours of riding when it’s dry.

Concentrate on the drivetrain by turning the crank while holding the chain in your soapy rag.

Lubricate Your Chain

After your chain is completely dry you need to lube it. Don’t wait over night or much more than a couple hours as you run the risk of rust. My personal favorite for all of my bikes is DuMonde Tech (no endorsement asked for/taken) but you can also do great with any number of other bicycle specific chain lubes. DO NOT USE WD40. WD40 is a cleaner for electronics…not a lube. If you have to you can get by with 3 in 1 oil or silicon based lube. What lube to use is entirely dependent on where you ride, what you ride and how you ride.

This takes longer than just slapping it on there but it is worth the time; drop lube onto each individual link. You may be tempted to simply spin the chain and hold the bottle of lube there and let it rip!

This only place on the chain that needs the lube is in the bushings. Not the outside and all over the plates…that just attracts dirt. After you have individually dropped lubricant onto each bushing spin the crank for about 2 minutes to set it in.

Wipe the Chain

take a clean(ish) rag and grab the chain and spin the crank to clean up excess lube. If you want to take it to another level you can put a little bit of alcohol in another rag and ever so lightly do the same thing to get the excess lube of the outside of the chain. Be careful not to squeeze hard and push alcohol into the bushings.

If you’re lubing a geared bike now would be the time to check your shifting.

BONUS TIP: Wipe the chain with a rag after every ride. The forces of riding can push lube out of the chain and attract dirt and grime.

Drivetrain

Let’s face it, your helmet smells nasty and the straps are crusted with salt from sweat. It’s starting to stink up your group ride.

Washing your bike helmet is not a great mystery and you should make it a part of your regular maintenance routine.

I wash my bike helmet in the shower and it works great.

The key is to use that shower poofy thing:

You can either load it up with body wash or even some shampoo so that your helmet has the same shine and bounce as your hair. Get the helmet pads and straps wet. I like to keep the straps in the helmet and hold it up side down. Then lather up the whole thing (helmet straps and all) with the shower poofy. Give it a good scrub for a few minutes. When washing my helmet after a really hot ride I’ll even squeeze out the helmet padding with my finger to get the sweat out and allow the padding to soak up some soapy water.

I wash the helmet first thing when I get in the shower. After scrubbing it I don’t rinse the helmet but let it sit while I handle all my other showering tasks. At the end I give it a really good rinse. You don’t want to leave any soap in the bike helmet padding, that would be a bad thing when sweat (and soap) start to run in your eyes.

Current Deals on Bike Helmets

That’s how I like to roll, but you can also wash your bike helmet when you wash your bike. I find that body wash and shampoo are much more gentle to my helmet when I wash it than the detergent I tend to use when I wash my bike. I wash my main helmet about once per week.

Accessories

Shimano has released some more images of the new Dura Ace 9000 and Dura Ace Di2 9070 drivetrain for us all to drool over, gawk at and make uneducated guesses as to the quality and performance of them. The question we all want answered? Is the new Dura Ace better than the old Dura Ace? It’s a valid question and it has a tough act to follow this year since SRAM made the new Red available. The new Red groupset is definitely a better group than the old Red.

It’s like Christmas for us around here this time of year when component companies start to show us their new wares.

Crankset

The first word I’ve heard uttered more than any other by those taking a first look at the new Dura Ace crankset is…ew! Since the begining of time cranksets have had the spider arms laid out in a symmetrical fashion and Shimano is bucking tradition in favor of an offset spider layout. You can see what they are trying to do here; concentrate the strength of the piece at the points on the chainring where you are putting out the most power. Time will tell if people can get over the aesthetic.

Levers

My complaint with Shimano levers out of the box has always been the reach adjust issue. On current and older Dura Ace levers with reach adjust, you get an gap that looks like your levers have their mouth open…which isn’t sexy. Shimano said they have fixed this. The Di2 and the 9000 appear fairly similar to current profile; maybe a bit more curvy. Shimano claims that ‘shifting effort has been cut in half’. I can only assume that means the throw is either lighter or shorter…or both.

Rear Derailleur

I will say, one of the things I noticed right away with the new Dura Ace drivetrain; They did a better job of hiding the Di2 motor in the rear derailleur.

Hopefully we can get some saddle time with the new group soon!

Drivetrain