Gear Floss Microfiber Ropes from Finish Line are a simple but very effective product that makes cleaning those hardest to reach places on your bike a breeze. If you use a wet lube, ride a lot of gravel, dusty singletrack or just like to keep your bike clean and detailed, this is a must have product. No more getting out the brush, degreaser and rags to clean your cassette, derailleurs and chain rings. Using these will keep the mess to a minimum where brushes can splatter and scatter grease and grime all over the place. They're like dental floss for your bike.
Each package of Gear Floss contains 20 microfiber ropes 20 inches in length with star-shaped grooves that attract and remove dirt, grease and grime. I put them to the test without using any type of degreaser or cleaner to see how they would perform based on the manufacturers claims. I was pleasantly surprised at how effective they were.
I started with my cassette which had a little bit of grime, but mostly dirt and gravel dust that gets into all of those little nooks and crannies. Like its name implies, it's as easy as flossing in and around the sprocket spaces and teeth. Thread the floss in and slide it back and forth to pick up and remove all that clings to your cassette.
I found Gear Floss extremely effective for getting into the space between the sprockets and cleaning the surface of each tooth on the cassette. As the Gear Floss carries away more grease and grime they get dirty and become less effective, but luckily I have 19 more to use to get the job done. How many you end up using to complete a cleaning will depend on how dirty or neglected things have become. For me, it took four of them to completely clean the rear cassette, deraileurs & cogs, the chain ring and some of the hard to reach places on and around the frame.
When cleaning the rounded sides of the idler and jockey wheels, the Gear Floss was a little less effective at getting all of the stubborn grime off. A quick scrub of the brush on these loosened it enough where a second pass with the Gear Floss picked it up and removed it. It was however effective at cleaning all of the surfaces of the derailleur's cage plate.
After a short time of cleaning with Gear Floss my cassette was as shiny as the day it was installed and my chain rings were were looking clean again. The ends of Gear Floss are just like the ends of a shoelace making them easy to thread into tight fitting areas. Not only can they be used to clean the above mentioned but also brake cables and calipers, around cable stops, hubs or any other hard to reach areas on your bike. Finish Line states they are highly tear-resistant and I found this to be true. They are washable, but reasonably priced so I just threw the dirty ones away.
In conclusion, I am glad I found this product because I hate cleaning my cassette, derailleurs and chain rings but now that I have used Gear Floss I won't be as reluctant to keep a clean drivetrain.
Disclosure: Finish Line did not supply the package of Gear Floss Microfiber Ropes for this review, I purchased them on my own and will continue to do so again.
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