I noticed on forums that this week was the start of cycling goods at Lidls, some promising items of dubious quality but very low price.   I was not at work for the day so I thought I would take a look seeing I was in need of new cycling gloves after leaving mine on the back of my bike and cycling off after the Brighton Breezy last year.   At £3.49 during the Lidl cycling event they seemed to have my name on them.

Walking out of Lidls I had the new gloves, new sun glasses (£2.99!) and a new bike maintenance stand.   The gloves were good (on par with the cheap Halfords ones before), the sun glasses were… cheap but functional.  The stand (only £24) I was interested in.   Once I got home I decided it was time to clean the Royal and putting it on the stand would make it a lot easier.  I had also decided to change the saddle back.      During the week before I had purchased a large container of “Rhino Goo” which told me all I had to do was spray it on my bike, leave it for five minutes and then rinse off, it would be like magic!   Not completely taken in on the advertising, it was only because people had recommended a similar Muc Off product and indeed I had watched the You Tube videos of something spraying it all over, what I thought, a pretty clean bike, rinsing it off and bingo, a clean bike!     Pretty pricey however, if I was going to be swept up with all this marketing magic then I was going to do it a tad cheaper.   A quick five minutes on ebay and a massive bottle of Rhino Goo, promising just the same (although in this case it suggested it would work with motorbikes and caravans as well as bikes!) for not much more than a tiny bottle of Muc Off spray was on its way to me.     Armed with a spray bottle of Goo and a spray bottle of clean water, along with a watering can of more water, I was ready.

Setting up the stand was pretty straight forward, but like a music stand but on a larger and heavy duty scale.   I fitted the magnetic tool holder, something actually quite useful when working on shingle.   The legs spread out pretty wide which meant even on the not so flat bit of shingle I was on, it was all pretty steady when I placed the bike on.   I tightened bits up and all was ready for the cleaning.

Water down with the watering can, spray with Goo over and over, give some parts a bit of a rub, especially the tyres and up under the mud guards, leave while you make a cup of tea.   Come back, rub down some tougher bits, rinse with the clean water spray, another watering can of clean water and let it all drip dry.

While drying, load chain cleaner with Gunk degreaser and whizz it around a number of times.   In the stand, this was much easier than on the floor where back pedalling means your chain spends a lot of the time jumping gears and ultimately coming off.  Pedalling forwards I had none of this problem.     A quick brush with degreaser in all the cassette, wipe chain dry again by pedalling, bingo.

Dry last bits off, spray on some funny stuff from Halfords that tells me it will displace any last bits of water (I doubt it), give a quick polish.   Re-oil chain, rub of excess by pedalling.  Job done.

I don’t think it was any quicker but it was a lot lot easier just walking around the bike, getting to bits underneath and being able to pedal.

While on the stand, I replaced the saddle with the more padded one again making sure the angle was not tipping me off, no need to bend down as everything was at standing height.

Took bike off, folded stand up and stored out of the way.   Pretty much a success making me wonder that the stands costing hundreds of pounds do that my £24 one does not.    The only grumble was the stick for keeping the front wheel straight, you were meant to hook a piece of rubber with holes in it onto the pole but the holes just seemed so very small.  I am sure after a lot of swearing and such like I would had got it, but using the bungee rope normally on the back rack did the job just as good, quickly and without swearing.