Rear End Grease/Chain Conversion

[Turtleface]

Had some specific questions come up during my chain conversion last night, and didn't want to muck up my REAL conversion thread with lots of questions. Just trying to keep that thread nice and easy to follow for anyone that might use it later on. Trying for a tutorial sort of thing, with lots of pictures.

I finished disassembling my drive assembly (chain, sprockets, etc) last night, and everything is just gross and dirty. Wearing fine, but the bike did sit for a while before I bought it. Pretty sure most of the previous owners cleaned the bike, but only the bodywork, it seems. So, I'm looking for my nylon brushes, and prepping a new solution of Simple Green in order to get everything back to being nice and shiny. After I've taken all the filth off, what is the best product I can buy to grease everything with? Are there any types of grease I should stay away from?

Is it safe to assume that using some of the light duty Locktite on all my bolts is ok? I've never actually had anything important back out on me, but I do like a bit of piece of mind.

Something else just popped into my head while I was re-reading my post. I was planning on soaking some of the dirty pieces for a while in a strong solution of Simple Green. Maybe equal parts water and Simple Green, or two parts water to one. Is there anything that I SHOULDN'T put in there? Any bits that will react badly? Maybe a more suitable mixing ratio?

 

[Nessism]

Simple Green is corrosive to aluminum, it's no worry under normal conditions but I wouldn't leave aluminum parts in the green sauce for days at a time. For heavy degreasing I prefer to use mineral spirits (paint thinner). You can recycle the solution and put it in a 2 liter soda bottle where the heavy sludge will settle to the bottom thus allowing you to pour off the clean stuff on top. Once the majority of the sludge is removed, move to the green stuff for the final clean up and that nice minty freshness.

 

[Turtleface]

Yeah, was planning on maybe an hour or two. Just enough to loosen stuff up. I've got mineral spirits though, so I'll give that a go first. Simple Green worked so incredibly well on the frame, from a spray bottle! I'll follow up with that, then a final wipe with some VM&P Naptha to take off any residue. Any idea on the grease? Manual calls for Suzuki "Super A", not sure of it's composition.

 

[Nessism]

Yeah, was planning on maybe an hour or two. Just enough to loosen stuff up. I've got mineral spirits though, so I'll give that a go first. Simple Green worked so incredibly well on the frame, from a spray bottle! I'll follow up with that, then a final wipe with some VM&P Naptha to take off any residue. Any idea on the grease? Manual calls for Suzuki "Super A", not sure of it's composition.

Make sure to rinse off that Simple Green using water, you can follow up later with some Naptha after that as necessary but you shouldn't need any if everything is well rinsed and dried off.

Not sure what you are trying to grease but my favorite type of grease is marine type since it's thick and waterproof. I don't use grease on chains though if that is what you are thinking of, a dedicated chain lube is preferable in my view.

 

[Turtleface]

Make sure to rinse off that Simple Green using water, you can follow up later with some Naptha after that as necessary but you shouldn't need any if everything is well rinsed and dried off.

Not sure what you are trying to grease but my favorite type of grease is marine type since it's thick and waterproof. I don't use grease on chains though if that is what you are thinking of, a dedicated chain lube is preferable in my view.

I've got a can of that neat DuPont stuff from the WebBikeWorld review, for the chain. I've got a tub of Valvoline Multipurpose Grease, for Ford Lincoln and Mercury. Moly-fortified. Think it'll do? I'll probably pull it all apart in less than a year to check everything out, so it's not something that needs to have an extreme service life.