Motorcycle and Scooter appreciation

For those who care about bike cleaning, what's your go to?
At home with a bucket and simple green?
Take it to a wand wash?
Anyone try the waterless route with those cans of degreaser, wax, and whatever chemistry they use to make a fine mist come out of the nozzle with notes of bubble gum and napalm?

I try not to use a pressure washer on a bike, nor harsh oil removers or harsh wheel cleaners.

I have no idea about sno foam stuff. But that seem to be popular. There are many but no idea if one is better than the other.

I'm a two buckets, car shampoo and microfibre wash mit, micro fibre cloths and rags. Wetting the bike with a bottle pressure sprayer (containing water and car shampoo mix), and doing one area of the bike at a time. Such as tank, start at the top and work my way down. Trying to keep the muddier road dirt covered areas till last.

Also have a selection of round brushes for different areas of bike, such as one for wheels, brakes, chain and sprockets.

I use the washing time to see if anything needs things looking at.

I'm awful now. But before I would:

1. Light hoze all over to lossen dirt.
   
2. Diluted citrus degreaser spray the bottom half, wait a few mins then light rince
   
3. Fling soapy suds all over and leave for 5mins, then light rinse
   
4. Two bucket method washed in thirds - top, middle, bottom.
   
5. Spray non-paintwork with some protective stuff I forget the name of and wax the paintwork.
   

Hose off. Motoverde general cleaner all over, Oxford mint chain cleaner on the chain and sprockets. Let it sit on there for a few minuites then a bucket of warm soapy water with washing up liquid and a can of brake cleaner on standby for the really tuff grime.

Washing up liquid is bad, you know that.

This is for my little Vespa, maybe not as much exposed engine bits as the big boys, but I assume most of the same applies.

Thanks all!

@jambon

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-7YRvxE4J0M

Watched this yesterday and spammed my insta followers with it too. Really need to get over to the Manx at some point.

Is it bad I quite like this? Actually, don't answer that.

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It’s…. Unique

What is it supposed to be?

What size engine tho.

Originally R1200R. @Soul I respect your diplomacy, thank you :)

Also my opinion may be skewed as I like buells.

Fugly to look at, but when you are riding the bike, you can't see it but it is fun to ride.

You should check this out then. And listen to Mat O, obvs....

https://www.instagram.com/motogpmatoxley/p/C_5Mh-9ISe_/

Superb, this is going to make for extremely exciting racing!
Manufacturers will be VERY invested in this too surely as I can imagine it will have a real impact on sales!

No idea what oil is in there now. The suspension is working well, so it'll do me for another month or so.

Makes a lot of sense and reinforces why bike racing in the 90s was so popular as an example. Race on Sunday sell on Monday etc... New bike sales figures at the moment are very depressing!

Been using it for like 20 years so I'm going to say it's perfectly fine.

Looks a lot like all the bikes from the US hooligan series, which by the way, is a fucking riot to watch.

Bye then.

(Sold it, 100 mile round trip in the van to drop it off because I’m nice.)

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Sold mine too. Bye! Ridiculously cheap but oh well.

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Oh no! How comes? Is that the grey/yellow R model?

After 4 years!

https://imgur.com/gallery/ignition-1vCWGl8

Yeah, 675R. It went well, although I never changed the rear shock preload and it was way oversprung for me.

Insurance cost doubled and since I got the RVF400, I couldn't justify keeping it - despite having finally fixed all the electrical issues it had.

RVF got an oil change. It's leaking a tiny bit of coolant but a bit of riding has made it run a lot better now/grabby clutch has fixed itself. Shame I hardly got to ride it over summer.

Nice. Was it hard to get running?