It depends upon the chain. I've been wrenching on bikes for 35-years starting with an after-school part-time job in high-school. Then 10-years straight in professional shoppe. Along with 10-years of racing (6.5 in cat1-2-pro). I have tried every single combination of chain lubes and processes available over the years, with a large database of experience in this arena.
Back to my "it depends upon the chain" comment. Waxes and hydrocarbon-chain based lubes worked great back in the days of bushing chains and large contact surface-areas. Nowadays with bushingless-chains, the contact-area between the side-plates and pin is miniscule with much higher pressure in the contact areas. Chain-life and durability depends more upon the extreme-pressure/extreme-heat additive than on the hydrocarbon-film (chains don't get pressurized lubrication-system like car-engines).
The lube you use and the procedure you employ depends upon your goal of chain-maintenance time and durability. Some people are perfectly satisfied with 3000-mile chain-life and 1-hour maintenance per month. Personally, most of my cycling experience has been from the starving-student budget side where I'd rather trade time versus spending money on new chains (Dura-ace chains only cost $27 mail-order back in the '80s). For me, the product and process that gives me the longest chain-durability when riding through inclement weather has been:
1. immediately after ride, scrub chain with mineral spirits (hosing with water will be OK, but need more follow-up later)
2. repeat with clean mineral-spirits until drip-off is clear
3. scrub with acetone, this dissolves both the mineral-spirits and water and gets them out of your chain
4. hit with hair-dryer to ensure all liquids are gone from inside the chain
5. drip a drop of Chain-L lube on each link and spin around for 2-minutes to work into chain
Going through rainy 45-minutes commutes to the shop, I was able to get +6000 miles out of a Dura-ace chain using this procedure & lube. In good weather +8000 miles. Again, there is no one "best" solution, it comes down to your personal requirements in chain-life and maintenance-time. Start a log, try different things, and see what give you the best bang-for-the-buck/time-per-dollar-spent ratio.
Last edited by DannoXYZ; 12-26-12 at 04:46 PM.