Where to Grease Your Bike

Hey, Peter at SixThreeZero. Everybody wants to know this: where do I grease my bike? Let's do it.

All right. As you probably already know, a regular bike and an E-bike have more grease than a roadside diner, but there are only three places that you need to worry about. I'm going to tell you about all the places, but then I'll tell you what you need to worry about. There's grease in the hubs, in both wheels. There's grease in the bottom bracket where the cranks go. That's pretty much it for the grease that you don't really need to touch, but then when you're putting your bike together, you don't have to have grease in these next three areas, but it's always a good idea. And in a bike shop, they'll always do it. And the main reason is so that the metals don't seize to each other and make the parts unremovable later on.

So first of all, when you're putting the stem in, a lot of people call it a gooseneck.

So gooseneck or stem, that will go in here. And the way that it works is it has a wedge here that when you tighten on the stem bolt, it pulls the wedge up against the angled end of the stem, and it actually jams itself inside the head tube. There's nothing that it connects to inside the head tube. It just jams in there. But anyway, put grease on that. The wedge is always just a bare piece of metal. And on the inside of the head tube is also bare metal. Those can fuse over time if it's not greased. So, you don't have to use grease immediately. If you don't have grease in your garage, you're putting your bike together, just put all the parts on. You don't need it. But if you're concerned, later on, get some grease or ask a neighbor.

Some people have some automotive grease lying around, or you can just use almost any kind of grease, a bearing grease, axle grease.

Any automotive grease will do. Just something that's kind of thick, has some viscosity to it, and will coat the part. So put some grease on that, a little layer of that, and then stick it in there, tighten it back down. Okay.

The next thing is the pedals. These are a little more important. You don't have to have these greased. Again, it's not vital for function, but optimally, you will put grease on it. You'll put grease on the threads. Okay. And then thread it into the cranks. Okay. Again, that will help the metal from seizing to metal, getting stuck later on, and hard to remove. It also has some functional purposes, but not major ones.

The last thing you want to do is the seat post. Just put some grease on the seat post. The sole reason for that is that with any bike... This one would be less susceptible because this seat post is actually painted, whereas a lot of seat posts are either steel or bare steel, or bare aluminum.

They can also fuse to the inside of the frame. And it's quite common actually for a bike, especially if it's been left outside or if you're in places like Florida or other parts of the east coast where it's especially salty and humid, that your seat post will get stuck in there. So again, if you don't have grease at your house, just build the bike. You don't need it right now. You may not need it ever, but you can put it in those three places to help later on. Borrow some grease from a neighbor or maybe even buy a little bit. But I have especially seen... I think anyone that's been in the bike world for any amount of time has always seen that some seat post that's gotten seized inside here, and you can't do it. I'll tell you a funny story. One time I decided I couldn't get a seat post out for a customer.

I just couldn't do it. And I never let a bike beat me... By the way, don't ever let a bike beat you. Don't let a piece of Ikea furniture beat you. Don't let a television set beat you. Mitsubishi is wise, but you are wiser still. Okay? You can always beat that piece of furniture or that stupid assembly, or just get it done without the screw and get the screw later. All right? You can do it. So anyway, I said, "I'm not going to let this beat me." I've always been able to get a seized seat post out somehow, using, I don't know, Coca-Cola or wiggling it or smashing it with a hammer or whatever. This one I couldn't. So I said, "You know what I'm going to do? I've got a new idea." So I strapped the seat to a fire hydrant, and then I took a chain and put it around the bottom bracket on my car, and then I pulled the bike apart with my car.

I tried several times. I actually filmed it because we're like, "This is epic!" But I have to tell you it didn't come out. And so I had to tell the customer, "Look, I took it to the absolute limit." I want him to know that at least I had done everything I possibly could. I did more than bang it with a hammer or pour some Coca-Cola or whatever on it. But yeah, even pulling it, trying to separate it with my car and a fire hydrant didn't work. So anyway, that's what the grease is for there. If you want to do other grease, like for the hubs or for the bottom bracket or for the rear hub, that's also well and good. However, it's somewhat more involved.

You may not want to mess with it because it does require some adjustments that, although there it is not rocket science, it does require a fair amount of experience of knowing what you're doing to get the right pressure intention on those parts. So that's it for grease on a bike. I truly hope that that was helpful for you. If you liked it, please do like it and hit subscribe. It helps grow our channel. And if you need any help at all, please contact us. You can call us at (310) 982-2877, or email us at theteam@sixthreezero.com. Remember sixthreezero is spelled out S I X T H R E E Z E R O. theteam@sixthreezero.com. Thanks.