We all use our bikes for different things, whether it’s a Sunday club run, commuting, training or just for pleasure. It’s easy to ride it, but much harder to clean it. A lot of bike maintenance issues we face is because we aren’t looking after our bikes on a daily basis properly, and yes, it’s not easy to find the time to keep on top of jobs like this. So we have come up with a 60-second daily maintenance plan.
The most important thing is to just keep your bike clean! We would all love to keep our bikes perfectly clean and shiny, but the cold hard truth is that we can all be guilty of not keeping on top of this. A lot of us these days commute to work daily, and a full clean is just not possible to do every day. To help you out a little, we have put together a list of three essential tips to keep it clean without spending hours every time you go out riding!
3 Quick Bike Maintenance Tips:
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Wipe your Rims
Keep rags at hand. If you haven’t got rags at the ready then it’s all too easy to forget about it. With a rag, wipe down the rims on the wheels after every ride. This is simply because the grit and salt on the road eat away at the rims and cause them to wear out prematurely. Not just this, your brake blocks will also wear out much quicker than you would have liked and have to replace them more often than necessary.
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Wipe your Chain
Spray some GT85 or multi-purpose spray onto the chain leave for a few seconds and use another rag and wipe down the chain, Just 20 seconds on the chain is enough to get the bulk of the dirt grease and grit off the chain to ensure it runs smoothly next time out. The last thing you want is a seized chain the next time you commute in at the break of dawn and find you have to try and find the time to fix it, end up being late and wish you had have wiped it down the day before! Use the same rag to clean the jockey wheels, job done.
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Check your Tyre Pressures
Check tyre pressures, simple yet very effective. Tyre pressures can easily drop without you realising it. Tyre pressure dropping can lead to an increased risk of punctures and blow outs. The thing you want to avoid at all costs is to be repairing punctures on the side of the road in the wet and cold – do what you can to avoid it.
What Road Bike Tyre Pressures should you be Running?
Knowing what tyre pressures to run on your road bike is not as simple as you would expect. Read our handy tips on what tyre pressures to run depending on a number of different elements.
Don’t forget a few squirts on the rear mech and front mech to keep it happy and put it to bed.
If you have any questions or tips of your own you want to share then tell us at ProBikeKit and use the hashtag #YourRide.