Four sessions a week indoors from November, aluminium frame with a carbon fork, bike bolted into a direct drive trainer in a spare room with no fan. Everything looks fine while I am riding and then in spring I find corrosion on things I never touch. Willing to buy something to fix it, but I would rather understand what is actually causing the damage first.
A sweat cover over the top tube and stem plus a towel over the bars costs very little and catches most of it. They look faintly ridiculous and they work. Combine with a fan and wiping down, and the whole problem essentially goes away without buying a second bike.
Sweat is salty and it drips onto exactly the places you have listed: the stem, the top of the headset, the bolt heads, and down the head tube where it sits under the bar tape. It is not the sweating that does the damage, it is that it sits there overnight and every night for four months. The single biggest fix is a large fan, which cuts how much you sweat in the first place and evaporates the rest, and the second is wiping the bike down at the end of every session rather than at the end of the week.
Fan, cover, wipe down after every session, headset check in spring. Anyone who does all four gets no corrosion and everyone who skips one gets some.
@dartfit_dana · 6mo ago · 2 replies
The part that actually dies is the headset, and you will not see it until it feels notchy. Two winters of indoor riding with no cover took mine from smooth to rough, and when I finally pulled it apart the bearings were rusty and the race was pitted. Pull the top cap and look at the bearing once a season; it is a ten minute job and it will tell you whether your routine is working.
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@chainwax_chloe · 6mo ago
Also check under the bar tape at the same time. Sweat runs down the bars and pools at the wrap, and aluminium bars can corrode where you cannot see it.
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