Chain WAXing (yes it's that easy) - and other mysteries of this art!

[DavidJL]

I have never tried cleaning the chain before dunking in paraffin, figuring that I would not be able to get all of the solvent out of the chain properly. After the paraffin is melted, I decant it into another container and wipe out the accumulated gunk before dunking chain. After chain is removed, let the paraffin sit undisturbed so gunk can settle out. There are people who should not attempt to use paraffin, at least indoors...

 

[ratz]

Almost thou persuadest me...

I've been using the Squirt dry lube for a couple of months now, and I like it. I didn't even realize my chain had been making noise, until the first surprisingly quiet ride with the Squirt lube. (I never had noticed any difference with Purple Extreme or T-9.) I thought I had done a decent job of cleaning the chain on the Silvio, but black gunk is still working its way out of the rollers, so a more thorough cleaning is in order. At least the gunk is thinner, and easy to wipe off. Re-lubing is much neater and cleaner than with a wet lube, meaning I'm likely to do it as needed instead of putting it off.

What finally sold me was having to put the bikes on and off the trainer; I just got sick and tired of the mess; and we won't talk about that black stain on the carpet.

 

[LarryOz]

What finally sold me was having to put the bikes on and off the trainer; I just got sick and tired of the mess; and we won't talk about that black stain on the carpet.

.. or the clothing! That is also why I did it.
I'm looking back when I "waxed" - I waxed right after Calvin's - then rode 2000 miles, then waxed before N24HC, then have ridden another 2000 miles - and last 1500 have been outside - and last 500+ have been at the beach. I brought my crock pot with me - just in case - but chain is still working great and not squeking!
I think maybe one clue to my longevity is that I mostly ride fairly easily (power-wise) - Lots of ridding in the 100-150-200 watt range, and not much at all over 300. I know from the standpoint of the chain "stretching" that probably helps - but maybe it also helps from the lubrication aspect??

 

[RojoRacing]

So I've been bored out of my mind at work this week with all the machines on super long multi-day runs and me not able to actually run anything myself with the broken hand. So today I decided to try cleaning and waxing my existing chain that has been used for about 1000 miles with typical chain oil. Even with a pre-soaking in lacquer thinner then the ultra sonic cleaner with 3 different types of solvents i just couldn't get some of the staining off the inner plates which was expected but I had to try. The crock pot I got will heat water to 180degs with the lid on but only 150 with the lid off, oh and it takes 90 mins to get up to max temp. I added 1lb of pure paraffin wax beads to a glass jar then added 2 teaspoons of PTFE and 1/2 teaspoon of pure Molybdenum Disulfide. I placed the glass jar into the 150 deg water and walked away for 30 mins. I was surprised to only see about 70% of the wax melted with a wax iceberg floating in the center and a pile of white and black powder clumped at the bottom. I walked away for another hour and came back to perfectly clear jar of liquefied wax with powder at the bottom. So I grabbed my handy hand held blender and instantly turned my clear wax into black paint. I wasn't to impressed with the speed of the slow cooker so I grabbed the pressure cooker and checked out its performance. The PC brought cold water to a full boil in under 10 mins and when set on warm it holds it at 150 degs all with the lid off so it's like the SC but with an option to boil the water. I figure maybe the wax would be slightly thinner and better at finding its way into the tightest spot at 180-190degs vs 150 so I used the boil option to get the wax up to 190 the set it to warm before dropping in the 200 deg over heated chain. I placed the lid with the vacuum fitting onto the jar and let it soak for about 3 mins before connecting the vacuum line and flipping the switch. The air bubbles started jumping out of the wax making it look like an intense boil. After a few mins the air bubbles started to calm down and after another few minutes there were almost no escaping bubbles at all. I removed the chain and hung yo dry for a few mins then spin it over a piece of 1/2 conduit to break loose the wax from each link.

Even though the wax in the jar is solid black the wax left on the chain is so thin that the chrome plating still shows through for the most part. I cleaned the rest of my drive train so there would be no residual oils to contaminate the waxed chain. You can definitely feel the extra resistance of the fresh wax when spinning the cranks by hand and a small pile of wax on the floor showing how much excess had already chipped way with a few spins of the crank. I'll have to wait till tomorrow to fully break it in because it's to late to ride now.

Fully melted wax with powders at the bottom.

After mixing the contents

After 1 min of vacuum

After 3 mins of vacuum

After 5 mins of vacuum

 

[RojoRacing]

Bonus Content

The best way to dry a wet chain with a cast on

 

[trapdoor2]

Cool!
So, what level of vacuum (in/hg? mm/hg? Pa? Torr? Atm?) did you use?

 

[RojoRacing]

Cool!
So, what level of vacuum (in/hg? mm/hg? Pa? Torr? Atm?) did you use?

So this high end vacuum I'm borrowing is rated down to 10 microns but I doubt the way I'm fitting the hose to the jar is allowing me to achieve that. Normally to have inline vacuum gauges when your working with an AC system so you can monitor what level of vacuum you are at because it can take up to 20 mins or more on larger systems to reach 99%. The $100 vacuum unit I plan to get is rated at 75 microns which should be more then enough for this and pretty much any other future vacuum related project likes say carbon fiber production.

If I'm vacuuming down to 95% or more while at 500' elevation that's like 13 lbs per square on the glass jar. I'm surprise it doesn't implode under that pressure.

 

[trapdoor2]

Yah...I would expect the glass jar to be very strong under a vacuum. Glass does quite well in compression.

I would expect the lid to depress quite a bit under a strong vacuum...probably fail at the seals as it collapsed (and then if the release was sudden...the pressure change would likely cause the glass to fail). What I would do is instrument it and find the minim level that will do the job (which is what I was interested in). If you can do the job @ 50%, no need to expend the $$ to go for 95%.

That $100 HF pump looks to be the ticket. Sometimes HF has them on sale too...

For most of us, simply getting wax on the chain is good enough. The physical movement of the chain will likely serve to distribute lubrication into those tiny areas that are not covered by a simple dip & agitate. Still, I really enjoy seeing you do your thing here. Thanks!

 

[Zzzorse]

 

[RojoRacing]

Yah...I would expect the glass jar to be very strong under a vacuum. Glass does quite well in compression.

I would expect the lid to depress quite a bit under a strong vacuum...probably fail at the seals as it collapsed (and then if the release was sudden...the pressure change would likely cause the glass to fail). What I would do is instrument it and find the minim level that will do the job (which is what I was interested in). If you can do the job @ 50%, no need to expend the $$ to go for 95%.

That $100 HF pump looks to be the ticket. Sometimes HF has them on sale too...

For most of us, simply getting wax on the chain is good enough. The physical movement of the chain will likely serve to distribute lubrication into those tiny areas that are not covered by a simple dip & agitate. Still, I really enjoy seeing you do your thing here. Thanks!

If we consider this $900 vacuum pump I'm using right now 100% then I'd rate the $150 two stage pump at HF for about 75% and the $100 single stage pump at 50%. The thing is the vacuum graph is a steep curve so when we're talking about effective vacuum it's basically all in that 98% and above. Your not going to find a vacuum rated at anything above 250 microns because at that point it wouldn't be effective as a service tool. Those $30 pumps on eBay are going to work about as good as the $100 HF model but you'll probably be sacrificing durability and ease of return if it dead on arrival.

Maybe in the future I'll grab the gauges and record the actual vacuum level.

 

[trapdoor2]

Yah, you won't know until you instrument it. I've got a bottle of MoS2 powder around here somewhere...but I think I'll just order a bag of wax so I can play too. I saw a crock pot down at a thrift-store the other day for $5. Looked new.

 

[RojoRacing]

The crock pot I got was $14 new so not a big investment. The Pressure cooker that I like using for this a lot better because of its speed was like $100 a few years ago so I think I'll recommission the pressure cooker for chain waxing and buy a new pressure cooker for the daily oatmeal. All the seals and O-rings were on their last leg so it was time.

Like others have said, chain waxing is easy so don't over think it. But I my case I'm currently very bored and like tinkering so why not push the limits and so what can be done different.

 

[RojoRacing]

First ride on the waxed chain was on the trainer for 2hrs. As the light as the wax coating looked yesterday I'm very surprised at how much is trying to flake off the chain but still hanging about. I looks dirty(blackened) because of the added powders but it's still clean to touch which is nice. Crank seems to spin much easier then yesterday but I can't say if it's as good as an clean piled chain, I just never really payed much attention. Looking at my strava data from the ride which I rode in one gear to whole time you can see the initial break in period. After my legs warmed up in the first mile I basically held the same cadence and speed for 2 hrs but my power out put slightly dropped over the first 8 miles. Some of that drop in power shod be the fluid in my trainer warming up and thinning out, again I never really payed attention in the past.

How many miles did you guys say was needed to achieve max efficiency after break in?

If my chain is always going to stay this clean then I'm kind of bummed I went with the Gold TiN KMC chain instead of the Black and Red diamond coated KMC option. I really wish chains came 10 links long so we don't have to by two. At least that one extra chain will get me through the next 10 chains.

 

[RojoRacing]

Speaking of chain quick links. What's the idea behind trying to place the quick links on opposite side of the chain instead to using one full length and just splicing in the needed extra 10 onto the end?

You guys think the master link tolerances are different enough from the other links that you could benefit from them not riding on the chain ring of cogs at the same time? Seems like splitting hairs that do t exist to me.

 

[ratz]

Speaking of chain quick links. What's the idea behind trying to place the quick links on opposite side of the chain instead to using one full length and just splicing in the needed extra 10 onto the end?

You guys think the master link tolerances are different enough from the other links that you could benefit from them not riding on the chain ring of cogs at the same time? Seems like splitting hairs that do t exist to me.

The master link are slightly thiner and they take the wax a little different. When they are close together Stiffing is a tad more likely to over shift and jump the ring. The boy over a BROL with the big heavy trikes have had problem with master links being a little less strong when climbing with mass weight; if you get them opposite then only one line bearing load instead of two so ½ the chance of failure.

It's all purely subjective caution since a few of us do massive miles self-supported.... Most of use really abuse the never use them more than 1 time recommendation also. 9 speed one were unlimited reuse; 10sp ones were suppose to be 10 uses; 11 speeds are suppose to be 1 time. I use mine about 30-40 times, and I carry two spares on the bike.

 

[ratz]

First ride on the waxed chain was on the trainer for 2hrs. As the light as the wax coating looked yesterday I'm very surprised at how much is trying to flake off the chain but still hanging about. I looks dirty(blackened) because of the added powders but it's still clean to touch which is nice. Crank seems to spin much easier then yesterday but I can't say if it's as good as an clean piled chain, I just never really payed much attention. Looking at my strava data from the ride which I rode in one gear to whole time you can see the initial break in period. After my legs warmed up in the first mile I basically held the same cadence and speed for 2 hrs but my power out put slightly dropped over the first 8 miles. Some of that drop in power shod be the fluid in my trainer warming up and thinning out, again I never really payed attention in the past.

How many miles did you guys say was needed to achieve max efficiency after break in?

If my chain is always going to stay this clean then I'm kind of bummed I went with the Gold TiN KMC chain instead of the Black and Red diamond coated KMC option. I really wish chains came 10 links long so we don't have to by two. At least that one extra chain will get me through the next 10 chains.

That looks pretty normal; as it flakes off it carries the dirt away in the flake. Get use to having piles of it below the trainer to vacuum up. After about 4-6 hours it seems to settle down and after about 8 it will be good and loose and fast. Shifting will speed the process obviously; the 11T will loose it faster than the 19T cog.

Now you get to learn to listen for when the chain gets squeaky versus good and loose and fast.

 

[RojoRacing]

Here's another question for the waxing pros. I have 6 brand new chains I plan to strip clean and wax for future use on several bikes. I'm not going to cut each chain to the exact length because each bike can be slightly different so I was going the just wax the whole chain as is then cut at the time of install. Do you think the cutting of the chain and reuse of the master link would cause enough loss of interior wax to be a concern for longevity on that first run? In every video and picture I've seen about waxing chains they always have the chain broken without the master installed. I waxed my chains with the master in place because it's easier to handle and then the master gets its wax all in one.

What are your thoughts.

one time use on a 11 speed master is a bunch of marketing and liability BS. 9 out of 10 broken chains on the mtbs are not broken at the master, and no I've never broken a chain, not even on the single speed.

 

[RojoRacing]

That looks pretty normal; as it flakes off it carries the dirt away in the flake. Get use to having piles of it below the trainer to vacuum up. After about 4-6 hours it seems to settle down and after about 8 it will be good and loose and fast. Shifting will speed the process obviously; the 11T will loose it faster than the 19T cog.

Now you get to learn to listen for when the chain gets squeaky versus good and loose and fast.

Going to be hard listening for the chain when I have my very expensive sound isolation SHURE earbuds in while playing video games to the sound of Slipknot

 

[DavidCH]

$900 vacuum pump

I am impressed... Perhaps attach an accessory to a trainer and then you could use bike power to create a vacuum in a glass for free. That pump must make a considerable amount of racket. Don't forget the ear protectors.

 

[ratz]

Here's another question for the waxing pros. I have 6 brand new chains I plan to strip clean and wax for future use on several bikes. I'm not going to cut each chain to the exact length because each bike can be slightly different so I was going the just wax the whole chain as is then cut at the time of install. Do you think the cutting of the chain and reuse of the master link would cause enough loss of interior wax to be a concern for longevity on that first run? In every video and picture I've seen about waxing chains they always have the chain broken without the master installed. I waxed my chains with the master in place because it's easier to handle and then the master gets its wax all in one.

What are your thoughts.

one time use on a 11 speed master is a bunch of marketing and liability BS. 9 out of 10 broken chains on the mtbs are not broken at the master, and no I've never broken a chain, not even on the single speed.

I've been just dunking the master links separately about ten of them at a time and after they dry stick them in a Baggie use as needed. Doing it that way they tend to have more wax than the rest of the chain.