Clean Machine

Today I have been doing the final preparations to my bike in readiness for our adventure next week. This mainly consisted of making sure nothing was lose and giving her a damn good scrub. As you can probably see from the photos here, I did quite a though job. I even managed to get all of the chain oil off the back wheel.

The whole process took around 7.5 hours, which included a lunch break and numerous cups of tea. Perhaps a little excessive, but I do like to do it properly.

I can really recommend the Auto Glym products. Their Super Resin Polish is, well, Super I suppose. It is effortless to use, gives very deep shine and disguises all these little scratches that almost 30,000 miles of riding creates. The one half litre bottle has lasted near 2 and a half years.

My bike generally get a clean once a fortnight, but since the hose pipe ban started in June 2005 it’s been a real pain to get all the muck off the underside with bucket off water. Have you ever tried throwing water from a bucket in an upwards direction 2 inches off the ground? If you have you’ll know that you end up wearing most of it. On a recent visit to Halfords I came across a plant sprayer that had been converted into a car washer. It’s made by Hozelock, saves an awful lot of water and helps keep my trousers drier. However, it cost me almost £20.

Sods law of course dictates that it will rain during the week undoing all my hard work.