Originally Posted by
Wattsup
What I do now is to re-lube the chain between every ride. Here's the scenario. Start out with a sparkling clean chain cleaned in mineral spirits. Lube using wet lube. Go ride. Come back from the ride, chain is dirty. Before next ride I wipe down the chain with a rag moistened with a bit of mineral spirits. Then I lube liberally with wet lube. And then I go ride. Do that for five rides or so, and then go back to step one.
The reason you do all that is because your lubricant
requires it. If you are willing to live with the grim, you wouldn’t have to wipe or clean but we all know how that would turn out.
Contrast what you do in toto to what I do. I get a new chain, clean it in mineral spirits, put it on the bike and ride. I lubricate when it needs it...about every 500 to 600 miles...and that’s all. I don’t clean again because it simply doesn’t need. I don’t wipe it after every ride because it doesn’t need it. I don’t even need to remove the chain for any reason other than removal or, in a few cases, work on the drivetrain. When I do remove it, I don’t need gloves to handle the chain.
Having elaborate cleaning procedures doesn’t extend your chain life nor does using a lubricant that requires elaborate cleaning procedures. So the question to ask is why use a lubricant that makes for more work?
Originally Posted by
Garfield Cat
When is a chain really "dirty"? One engineer told me that all lubricants contain some detergents and that's what appears to turn dark. Dark because the detergent ingredient is doing its job.
Is there a way to test this? Perhaps if you ride the bike indoors on a trainer as if it were a controlled environment. Ride maybe an hour a day for a week. It doesn't even have to be a strenuous ride. By controlled environment, I would mean with the garage door closed and the room is practically spotless.
Between each day's ride, when the bike is stored, the entire drive is kept covered to prevent any contamination but allowed to breathe with some ventillation.
I wouldn’t say that
all lubricants have detergents. Motor oil does but that is for a different purpose and environment. Bicycle lubricants may not as a detergent is unneeded for a exposed system like a bicycle chain. It might even be detrimental since it would increase the water solubility of the lubricant. Some people have pointed out that the detergent in motor oil makes it less desirable as a bicycle chain lubricant.
As to what make the chain black, it is finely divided metal particles (mostly iron) and finely divided soil particles (primarily quartz). And, by finely divided, I mean microscopic or nearly so.
My waxed chain doesn’t collect dirt to a significant extent. Nor does the lubricant have detergents in it. But the lubricant gets a bit black from the chain wear. Since the lubricant sluffs off through design, my chain doesn’t get as black because of the particles but I can see some dark spots.