Originally Posted by
RubeRad
???
SB says "New chains come pre-lubricated with a
grease-type lubricant which has been installed at the factory. This is an excellent lubricant, and has been made to permeate all of the internal interstices in the chain."
I just put on a new chain last week, it sure seemed greasy rather than waxy to me.
Notice he says grease-
type lubricant. The "type" part is important. According to
Wikipedia,
Grease is a semisolid lubricant. Grease generally consists of a soap emulsified with mineral or vegetable oil.
That's a good definition of bearing grease but, as many cyclists can tell you, bearing grease isn't all that water resistant.
The other part of the problem is in definitions. Most people's experience with a "wax" is with a hard wax like candle or canning wax. Many people probably have experience with another wax that they don't realized is a "wax". Petroleum jelly is a "wax", it's just soft. And it feels "greasy". It's also more water resistant than a surfactant based "grease".
I'm not saying that the chain lubricant is petroleum jelly. It's some kind of mixture of various semisolid petroleum distillates. But, based on what I can find out about the mixtures used...they are proprietary and there's not much information on them...they are based around soft waxes. It more like
Cosmoline than like
bearing grease.
More importantly, the lubricant that so many think is "excellent" isn't liquid oil. It's a semisolid lubricant that is more like wax based lubricants than liquid oils.