Originally Posted by
gauvins
Maybe. I'd tend to think that rain gets more grit on a chain because the wheel sprays a mix of water (rain) and grit (from the road surface) that is almost non-existent when the sun shines. As as far as I understand the argument, both wax and oil are equally affected by rain, due to dirty spray. Below is a screenshot of a notebookLM summary performed across ZFC's numerous documents. Note that the % refer to the % of the 0.5% target wear.
The wax..even drip wax…may be pushed away from the pressure points (pins inside and between the plates on the outside) but it is only pushed out of the way. The wax is still in place which blocks much of the grit getting into the chain unlike oil where the oil actually sucks the grit into the internals. The water can get past the wax because the system isn’t sealed but the water and the corrosion it causes are the reason waxed chains start to squeak shortly after water exposure.
[I don't recall who suggested that ZFC was a not a great source of information. I've read the critique. Didn't really understood what was not OK -- we can always argue that a different test methodology would give different and perhaps better results....]
That would be me. I was skeptical of ZFC results before I read the Hamblini piece based on his very wild claims of increased mileage for waxed chains in addition to his very silly cleaning procedure. Hamblini just confirmed what I was suspecting.
The graphic is lacking context. Are “drip lubes” waxes or oils? Are wet lubes waxes or oils? Averaging all drip lubricants and coming up with a very large number is just indicative of the variance of the test and the lubricants. It’s not really a valid number without more context. It’s analogous to saying that 400 people have an average wealth of $500,000,000 when 399 people with $30 in the bank and one person has a billion in the bank.
This is all kind of moot for a chain for touring. Even if you are cycling for months at a time, worrying about chain wear shouldn’t be that much of a concern. Ride your bike, lubricant when necessary, preferable with a solvent wax system and replace the chain when it wears out or at 3000 miles if you are really worried about it. Hot waxing is okay for at home (too tedious for me) but out on the road keep it simple.