ACF50 and when to clean it?

Hi guys, hope you don't mind me dropping in on you here. Our site www.allyearbiker.co.uk has had quite a few hits come in from your forum so I took the liberty of looking in.

ACF50 has gained a lot of interest since it came on the market, naturally we're biased but we do believe it is one of the best corrosion protection products on the market. One thing we have picked up from the number of questions posted on various forums and from the mail we get, is that there are a lot of people with questions about what it does, how it's used, how effective is it and so on.

AllYearBiker was set up at the beginning of this year to offer an application service for ACF50, and it's kept us a lot busier throughout the year than we'd expected. However, the intention is not just to offer this service but to develope the site into a biker-to-biker service offering advice and information on cleaning and maintaining your bike. We have a series of articles planned for the site in the New Year giving details on cleaning techniques and products, and are looking at launching a message board so people can post any questions they have and we'll answer them directly on the board.

Having cleaned, polished and ACF50 treated around 300 bike this year so far we think we've gained a bit more knowledge than the average user, knowledge we're more than happy to pass on to anyone wanting to clean and protect their bike themselves. So, if I can be of any help answering some of your questions I'll do my best. :beerjug:

Cheers
Roy
 
Roy,
I am a member of the Ipswich IAM group and I thought a bike treatment day might be a good club event but I haven't had a lot of response as yet. I posted the suggestion on our forum (which admittedly doesn't have many users) and I only got one reply so far, and he wasn't convinced about the idea of spraying ACF50 and not washing the bike for months. I have copied his reply below and I would be very interested to hear your opinion.

I use the ACF50 (spray can) and it is very good at keeping the bike protected. What I can't get my head around is the idea of having it professionally applied as a protection for winter. Leaving any bike dirty and covered in winter crud will lead to expensive repair/rectification work on the brakes, seals, and suspension. In anycase these are areas you should be checking regularly and you can't do that if it is dirty. "So wash it!" they cry - Exactly! If you wash it so you can do all your routine maintenance checks then you remove some of the ACF50, maybe not from those hidden places behind the tuppaware, but certainly from the bits you are probably hoping to protect (ie. the shiny visible bits). You then end up spraying more on yourself from a can!

The service is probably useful as a one-off to get those difficult to reach areas coated, but I wouldn't look at it as the holy grail of keeping a bike perfect if you ride in all weahers.
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where can I get the 4 litre can? I have a compressor and gun, so don't really want to mess with spray cans.

cheers.

JP
 
Hi Spencetj,

Totally agree with a fair bit of what your mate says. We've had several people who we've ACF50 treated back in April/May come back to us and report that they haven't washed their bike since the treatment and so far not a spot of corrosion. The ACF50 obviously is doing the job for them.

The trouble I personally have with this is there can be too many variables that I don't know about. How often did they ride out, what weather conditions, is the bike garaged or stored outside??? The one solid piece of evidence I can go by is my own experience. I'm a biker just like you, I ride all year and in some pretty appalling conditions sometimes, but I like my bike to look reasonably clean and not covered in road crud for months on end. Also, it's a Bandit 1200. For me a good all round bike, but the build quality is pretty crap, so cleaning/maintenance/corrosion fighting used to be a full time job. Leave it with road crud or salt on for more than a day or two and the effects were pretty obvious.

Since I treated it with ACF50 I now simply hose it down after each ride out, and roughly once a week give it a clean down with an ordinary bike shampoo (NOT bike cleaner,these are designed to strip clean oil/grease and contaminants off a bike and therefore contain more detergent and TFR than normal shampoos, which will degrade any ACF50 coating much quicker). Often I get in late/tired/cold and don't get round to hosing the bike down for a couple of days after (sometimes longer if I'm honest). The ACF50 coating means I can now get away with this without the bike suffering ill effects.

This regime means I maintain a clean bike, and I'm still making regular maintenance checks on it. The ACF50 coating is getting degraded after each hose down and principly the shampooing, BUT, it's designed to withstand this for an extended period. It was originally designed for use on aircraft, think of the extremes of abuse they get, particularly external sections; they don't re-coat the aircraft after every landing!

On exposed sections of my bike this repeated exposure to the elements, hosing down and shampooing means the coating lasts for around two months before I can see that water is not beading off as effectively and the coating will benifit from topping up. This topping up is a simple job taking a few minutes. Get a microfiber cloth good and damp with ACF50 then lightly wipe over the exposed areas (most people aren't aware, but the manufacturers recommended application thickness is 2-5 thousands of an inch!). Go and have a cup of tea and come back an hour later, ACF50 creeps like mad and will have worked it's way into the nooks and crannies.

As importantly, those hidden areas and electrics/electronics which I can't get at to clean without a major strip down of the bike, but, where corrosion is certainly capable of forming unseen until it's too late and it spreads outwards, are being protected. And in these areas the ACF50 coating will continue to protect for a good 12 months without the need of any topping up.

I stated quite clearly on our web site that I don't believe ACF50 is a 'magic bullet' that will allow you to completely forget about caring for your bike. No such thing exists. While it's clearly been proved that you can apply ACF50 and leave it on your bike for a year without washing it, I personally can not recommend that for at least the reasons your mate has pointed out. Any good rider needs to be personal with his bike when so many of the components are vital to it's safety.

When applied and used properly what ACF50 can do is offer a level of protection that is one of the best on the market, cut your overall workload down considerably and maintain reliabilty of structures, fixings and electrical/electronic components. It allows you the latitude to not having to be a slave to constant cleaning and corrosion repair.

Sorry it's a long winded reply, hope it answers the question :beerjug: Incidently, I recently did a talk on our service at the Newcastle IAM meeting and the recent Newcastle venue we did was for their members. If you want to see what they thought of it might be worth giving them a shout. They're asking when we're arranging the next venue for them :thumb
 
I took my bike off the road for a while to give it a good clean and MOT prep. I give it a general service and changed fork seals. with the tank and seat off you can easily work away with a tin and a 1 inch brush. Spray a bit on the brush and dab it in everywhere. Spray on electrics and let it seep in...Get a good coating over the shocks, and underneath tank at access panel...let it sit overnight then quick wipe off..

ACF 50 is great stuff, it does exactly what it says on the tin.:thumb

This is second winter now and i have no rust. i would say its pretty much over my whole bike.
 
jp-speed-triple, how many bikes are you intending to do?? A 4 litre bottle of ACF50 will last you years if just your own bike. Did you know ACF50 has a shelf life of about 2 years, beyond that it degrades to a point that it's effectivness is reduced.

You might be better of going for the quart bottle, that'll give you plenty to coat your bike several times from the spray gun and regular hand wipe top ups to exposed sections. Plus save you a fair bit of money, 4 litres = £97, a quart bottle is £27.

Also be aware that when we carry out spray application we take a lot of care to ensure brakes/tyres are masked off to avoid the atomised liquid from going on to them. After the masking is removed these areas have to be carefully hand wiped to get coverage.
 
Where can you obtain ACF50, sounds like good stuff? I currently run a Pan European whilst I await a lump sum before ordering my GSA and it suffers badly in the winter with the brakes siezing. I can see that I can't use it on the brakesbut it might protect the rest of the bike and my possible trade-in value.

I commute every day, crosing the Forth Raod Bridge when the weather allows, come rain or hail. Snow can stop me, although I was the only bike to make it to Ingliston for last year's Scottish Bike Show Sunday, when it was cancelled yet again for snow.
 
Like some others I am a new user of ACF.

I hose the bike down with fresh water after any use on wet salty roads. I then re-ACF anywhere that looks like it could do with it.

I'm also worried about how long it will take to get rid of the stuff come the spring.:aidan
 
NA1959 said:
Like some others I am a new user of ACF.

I hose the bike down with fresh water after any use on wet salty roads. I then re-ACF anywhere that looks like it could do with it.

I'm also worried about how long it will take to get rid of the stuff come the spring.:aidan
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I'm new to ACF50 also and I tend to do the same, wash bike off if wet and mucky and reapply ACF50. But I don't understand people's concern about removing it in the spring - it's just like WD50 really, it should wash off no problem and if it doesn't then thats no a problem either right as it will continue to protect? The only think I've notice that I can say is negative about this product is that my nice and new shinny chrome exhaust headers from the manifold showing signs of spotting that won't polish out. I can only think it's the ACF50? A bit like minor rust spots all over but they are not rust spot - if you follow me?
 
skinnersscotch, as posted a few comments back you can buy it direct from here:

http://www.flyingshop.com/testindlvl...nd%20Chemicals

Also if you google it you'll find a number of places selling it on-line. Our own web site http://www.allyearbiker.co.uk should give you some information on what it does and how it's used.


NA1959, hosing your bike down after a ride out to remove any excess road crud/salt is exactly what I do with mine. You don't really need to top up the ACF50 coating after every hosing though. It's designed to polar bond to the surfaces and isn't water soluble so plain water will have a hard job removing it. If you see my previous post, I go around two months before topping up.
If you want to remove it completely come spring (?), two or three good wash downs with a bike cleaner such as Autoglym Motorcycle Cleaner or Hein Gerickes S100 will remove it.


ph4824, as above regards re-applying it. Actually it nothing like WD40. WD40 was a product developed in the early 1950's by a guy named Norman Larsen, principly for use on the military Atlas Rocket Program. These suffered from condensation problems which, when combined with the fuel fumes leaking from the rockets formed an intensely corrosive mix. Norman developed the formula for displacing the water on the 40th attempt (hence Water Displacement - 40th formula, i.e. WD40). For those with a long memory it was originally refered to as Rocket WD40. The formula was based around a hydrocarbon content with surfacants and emulsifiers to reduce surface tension and allow it to penetrate. However, to deliver this hydrocarbon in a spray form that would be effective the addition of up to 70-75% solvent was used. A byproduct of this amount of solvent was that WD40 was great as a degreaser! the downside was that little more than 25-30% of the active hydocarbon got laid down on the treated surface. Enough to displace water but not enough to act as a decent anti-corrosion defence. For that you have to apply copious amounts of the stuff for it to be anywhere near effective. This thickness of coating eventually congeals and dries out after a few days (couple of weeks if your lucky) and is a bugger to clean off as we know from personal experience.

With your chrome exhaust header, obviously I can't see it but it's highly unlikely to be the result of ACF50 application. Chrome exhausts are generally made from stainless steel with a coating of chromium a few microns thick bonded on. The thicker the chromium coating the more expensive the exhaust but the more resistant to staining and corrosion. It sounds like you may have microscopic metal particles, such as can come from wire wool, imbedded in the chrome. These would begin to rust and effectively 'stain' the chrome. Although it generally only gets on wheels I have seen an exhaust header that had brake dust get on it. Brake pads consist of a number of components such as monofilament carbon, Kevlar, metal fillings and polymer based adhesives. During braking bits of this shear off in the form of brake dust, the metal fillings will be hot and tend to burn into whatever they land on, while the adhesive residue binds and forms an acid when it gets wet that can etch into a surface. On the one I saw it produced blotchy like spotting which sounds a bit like your describing. It can be polished out but needs a slighly more aggressive polish. Try Meguires Scratch X, but don't go overboard or you'll risk erroding the chrome coating.
 
When are bikes going to build like cars??? I have a 9 year old Saab with no rust at all. Driven in all weathers and only gets washed a few times a year. was changing the brake pads and even the brake callipers have no rust. Yet I spend 12k on a bike and it starts to rust within a few weeks. Washing it down after every run with cold water but the wheel spokes are still rusting. Sorry moan over but I will try ACF50. By now a European bike manufacture should be able to produce a bike that does not rust.
 
Thanks Slick, very informative. When I compared ACF50 to WD40 it was really only a basic comparison in that both spray and both leave an oily residue. I will post a photo later of my exhaust - it's only done less than 500 miles, would love to get my hands on a better polish to remove the stains I'm getting.

In regard to rinsing off your bike after each ride? Rinsing it alone will not remove much grime or dirt but only disolve the salt away and so after rinsing the bike still looks dirty. I tend to wash down with wash n wax so will I have to reapply ACF50 each time I do? Lastly, do you rinse your bike down when it's not wet? Riding in the dry will still acquire some traffic film even if very slight splashes - is it worth rinsing or washing down after EVERY ride whether its dry or wet?

Cheers
Paul.
 
In regard to rinsing off your bike after each ride? Rinsing it alone will not remove much grime or dirt but only disolve the salt away and so after rinsing the bike still looks dirty. I tend to wash down with wash n wax so will I have to reapply ACF50 each time I do? Lastly, do you rinse your bike down when it's not wet? Riding in the dry will still acquire some traffic film even if very slight splashes - is it worth rinsing or washing down after EVERY ride whether its dry or wet?
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I think you have to bear in mind this treatment is a protective treatment and not a cosmetic one, so the bike may not shine quite as much as if it'd been polished up.

A good hosing down with water alone will have little effect on removing the coating, shampooing will degrade the coating but not to the extend that it needs topping up after every clean. Water easily beading off the surfaces is a good visual indication that the ACF50 is still working, when you can't see this happening any more is the time to top up.

I occasionally hose it down after a 'dry' ride (whatever the hell they are these days :augie), just depends on how much muck it's picked up along the way. In the end it really depends on your outlook, I got my bike to ride as much as I can. I don't really like it looking grubby so it gets a good clean and polish up when I'm in the mood, but I don't want to be a slave to cleaning it. As I said previously, ACF50 allows you the liberty of delaying or missing a few cleanings without the bike suffering the ill effects of corrosion.
 
ijg5 said:
When are bikes going to build like cars??? I have a 9 year old Saab with no rust at all. Driven in all weathers and only gets washed a few times a year. was changing the brake pads and even the brake callipers have no rust. Yet I spend 12k on a bike and it starts to rust within a few weeks. Washing it down after every run with cold water but the wheel spokes are still rusting. Sorry moan over but I will try ACF50. By now a European bike manufacture should be able to produce a bike that does not rust.
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Are you new to the world of motorcycles?

All motorcycles need looking after .................. without exception. ;)
 
Hosing

I may be talking bol..ks here but im sure i read somewhere that spraying your bike with cold water when coated in rocksalt speeds up the reaction on the alloy.and you should use warm water to wash it off.. Im a big fan of ACF50 my bruvs an aircraft tech they use it bigtime.I dont use my bike in this shite weather but its stored in a sometimes damp garage and iv sprayed it all over my beast,dont like it but it will hopefully keep it from turning in to a bag of bolts till spring when i can Gunk it off and wash and polish it..:Motomartin
 
Nippy Normans supply Touratech, Wunderlich, Desert Fox and many other makes of accessories.
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