Less than perfect bike grease for bolts and pedals

Question

I understand that a good grease for bike bolts is the Parktool grease.

The "gel squeeze threadlocker blue" pictured below is sold at my corner hardware store for curbside pick-up. Will this do to lock water out from pedals and shoe bolts? During this lockdown, I'm weary of placing yet another online order (and likely someone is worn out of packing and mailing).

Since grease inevitably stays in small amounts on one's fingers, not just on the bike's components, if you are in California and can confirm that this product manages to escape California's Proposition 65 warning, please do.

Related questions:

• What type of grease to prevent seat post sticking?
• Using Anti Seize in place of Grease
• What substance do they use to grease bottom bracket, crank, pedal bolts etc?

Answer 1

"I understand that the "perfect" grease for bike bolts is the Parktool grease." Parktool has a great reputation (and often a premium price) but it has no patent that would make every product they make The Best Thing(TM).

There are many good greases for many various manufacturers. There is not much to make wrong with a traditional grease (petroleum jelly), just choose the right viscosity. There are many modern greases with various additives (teflon, ceramic) from many manufacturers.

The main point of a grease is to maintain the surfaces easily separated, screwing and unscrewing possible, prevent rust and bonding of those surfaces. A thread-locker, on the other way mainly joins those surface and will enable firm connection with a smaller torque.

But also, some threads are to be greased and some are to be thread-locked. The manufacturers normally say which is supposed to be used. For example, pedal threads are normally greased, while stem and handlebar bolts are usually thread-locked. Also, bolts on derailleurs are usually thread-locked. Carbon on carbon in seat-tubes usually calls for carbon-paste while metal-on metal seat-tubes normally call for a grease. For shoe cleats you should read the recommendation of your manufacturer. Mine calls for a grease but I would expect a thread-locker to work fine too.

You should use what the manufacturer calls for especially when you are screwing to a certain torque setting. One could over torque the threads when greasing what was supposed to be thread-locked. Or the opposite.

Answer 2

Park Tool does not make grease. They buy from someone, probably Mobil, then rebrand it.

NLGI-2 grade marine grease is a good, general purpose grease for bikes, like Mobil SHP 222. For the price of Park Tool, Shimano, Sram or any other "magic" grease, you can buy off-the-shelf, half a kilo of great marine grease like SHP 222 and a nice grease gun. This will probably outlast the bike, you and few generations.

However, grease is not something that will stop galvanic corrosion, that is, steel "welding" to aluminium. The most effective compound to buy off-the-shelf is, copper grease. There are fancier montage pastes from manufacturers like Molykote, which are crazy expensive.

I use copper grease on bikes, cars and almost on every equipment I own, with huge success.

Still, it's a best bet to at remove seatposts, pedals, etc and re-grease them. Grease is much better then having nothing. Copper grease is much, much better.

A light threadlocker, not medium or high, when applied correctly, will also help SLOW galvanic corrosion due to no water ingress (electrolyte, in this case). It's much more expensive, shelf life is very limited, and not effective as copper grease, though.