We get various stuff donated to us (I've come to despise WD40), but in
terms of what to buy we took a tip from a local shop and use winter-
weight chainsaw oil. The reasoning is 1) it is fairly thin, 2) it
breaks down a bit better into the environment, and 3) one can use it
in old internal-gear hubs (apparently perfect for Sturmey-Archers). :)
We buy gallon jugs and pour into plastic oil dispensers.
We used to get our bearing grease donated to us by a wholesaler, but
that stopped for some reason (never quite found out why) and so now we
just buy a pail of high-temp grease from Canadian Tire and put it into
smaller containers.
From a Green standpoint, I once asked my dad (a metallurgist) about
using a non-petroleum-based formula. He said one could use grease made
from whatever veggie source, but that it would break down very quickly
due to the heat from friction. So while it would work be prepared to
overhaul your hubs every couple of weeks (or more). :P
So it seem that as long as one is dealing with metal-on-metal the
petroleum-based stuff seems to be a necessary evil. That said, perhaps
some bright minds may find an organic solution to this some day.
Mark Rehder - Coordinator re-Cycles Community Bike Shop http://re-cycles.ca
On 18-Nov-10, at 12:08 PM, Brian wrote:
Hello everybody...
Would you please share your thoughts concerning your choice in lubes
you use. Specifically:
- Chain lube. We use Prolink - expensive but good performance.
Would like a more "green" solution.
- General oil-like lube, we use Triflow. It's cheap.
For both, we buy bulk and refill the smaller bottles.
Could you please share your experiences and strategies? Perhaps
some sort of automotive lube instead of triflow? Anybody currently
supported directly by a lube company?Brian SLO Bike Kitchen Co-founder www.slobikekitchen.org San Luis Obispo, CA