Are You STILL Lubricating Your Chain Incorrectly?

Are you still making mistakes when it comes to cleaning and lubricating your chain? We hope not, but we have a feeling many people are! That's why in this video, Alex shares his top tips to make lubricating your chain correctly as easy as possible. 😉

00:00 How to easily clean, lubricate & maintain your chain
00:23 Start with a clean chain
01:32 Make sure you degrease a new chain
02:44 How to remove your chain
03:05 How to lubricate your chain correctly
04:54 Don’t fall for fancy marketing
05:51 That’s how to avoid common mistakes!

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🫧 Let us know your chain cleaning tips and lubricant advice in the comments! 🔗

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📸 Photos - © Velo Collection (TDW) / Getty Images & © Sprint Cycling Agency

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🫧 Let us know your chain cleaning tips and lubricant advice in the comments! 🔗

[davesutherland]

Mid 80’s I did a 25, 000km bike trip over 14 months. Did not carry any chain lube with me, just seemed like something that could leak and get on lots of things that did not need to be lubed. When the chain got rough, just went to a petro station and got an empty container of motor oil and pored a bit of the stuff still in the bottle on to the chain, gave it a wipe and I was good for another 1500 to 2000 km.

[Paksusuoli]

The lower pulley wheel needs to have a healthy layer of black tar caked on, that's how you know the bike is nice and ripe.

[agentcooper]

The irony of a GCN video telling you not to be drawn in by fancy marketing.

[sjbechet]

I'm a qualified Maintenance engineer, more importantly I hate un-necessary work. I've been installing, replacing and maintaining chains for 35 yrs for money. I've got 3 bicycles and 3 motorcycles.
The pins, bushes and rollers wear most in that order.
Wax is a crap lube, it has very little shear strength under load and does not wick back unless heat caused by friction damage melts it.
Primary drive chains in engines last for 100's of thousands of miles because they have constant clean lube, the more you clean and lube it the longer it will last.
Spending $200 on lube and cleaner to make a $50 chain last 2x longer is mathematically 2x more stupid than necessary.

[kristianvrum]

1. Do not remove the thick oil on a new chain with degreaser, just use Weldtite TF2 or similiar on a rag and simply wipe off the outside of the chain.
2. Do not use strong degreaser on any part of your bike (if you need to do that, you've used the wrong kind of lubricant in the first place).
3. Do not remove the chain from your bike unless you intend to replace it (completely unnecessary, and just a waste of time).
4. Do not use degreaser as part of your regular maintenance, wash your bike with ordinary cleaning products like MucOff Bike Cleaner or similar.
5. It doesn't really matter how much oil you apply on the chain, as long as it's enough to lubricate the rollers (you'll be wiping off the excess anyway).
6. In reality, it's using the bike that causes chain wear, and not your maintenance routines (just replace chain when it's worn out, and think nothing more of it).
7. Don't listen to advice in videos on YouTube where they are over-complicating things :-)

[spectro]

I'm a volunteer bike mechanic and so many bikes have their drivetrains caked with dirt. I'm guessing most people just load on the lube and call it a day. At least I get some satisfaction scraping off the thick greasy dirt from the jockey wheels. I tell people exactly what you said in these videos, and show them too.

[Knitterfest]

Your freehub might be loud as heck, but my dry chain is louder

[saveriodipoce]

Hi If you decide to lubricate each roller of the chain, before you wipe the extra lube from the chain, wait a couple hours to give the lube the time to penetrate into the rollers.

[awhite]

That clip of Si with his WD40 never gets old 😅

[tpoljsak]

I always follow Ollie's advice "Move chain to big sprocket rear/front to open the chain" when lubing a chain.👌

[JimStepsride]

I have been using a 50% strength of Simple Green. It works, smells decent, and doesn't destroy anything. I have also changed to a Wax Water chain lube. The chain is nice and quiet and does not pick up much sand or grit. I live in Florida; it is wet and sandy especially in the summer. So far so good with the new lube.

[macadamianut]

Good advice. The only thing I do in addition after the chain has been lubed and shifted through all the gears, is to back pedal the chain while using a rag to wipe down the outer surfaces of the chainrings and pulleys to get rid of excess lubricant. That excess shouldn't significantly affect chain or sprocket wear, but after several hundred miles of riding that excess can get caked, baked, and be harder to remove later.

[DoNuT_]

Still: Make your own experiences, try different things and keep in mind that there isn't 'the' product for every type of riding. I've had dry lubes that kept the drivetrain nice and clean for multiple (short) rides but when you rode way over 100 km in total, the chain got noisy and rattly because the lube must have *evaporated* - same in the rain, don't try your full-day epic in unstable weather conditions, some of these products are gone after just a few kilometers in the wet and break your heart when you move on with a noisy AF chain. Sometimes, you better accept that your bike is getting wet and dirty and apply something more sticky like mineral oil or wet-specific products (which attract dirt by nature) in the first place. Before anybody slides in the comments below, we're staying in the non-waxing realms, here. 😊

[oggy]

SAE 80 gear box oil from an oil can, and if needed, white spirit to clean it, which is rarely, as gear box oil does not attract dirt.
You do get some spray onto the back wheel, but I'm not arsed, I just want my chain to last, with the minimum of maintenance.
Seems to have worked for the past 50 years or so.

[rdint]

Ultrasonic cleaner using Pine Sol for cleaning agent. Rinse with dawn dish soap and rinse with clean hot water in sink until water is clean. Hang chain by end link and blow water off with air compressor until dry. Apply 1 drop of Muck-Off dry lube to each roller while chain is still hanging and allow to dry. I also clean the jockey wheels, cassettes and front chain rings. Works for me.

[JohnSmith-yw]

If you don’t put some sort of oil or wax based lubricant on the side plates….they will RUST! I’ve been using whatever (from 3 in 1 oil in the 80’s) applied to the roller links but if you totally clean and degrease your chain, unless you apply something to the side plate links, bare steel RUSTS

[schrodingerthecat]

Great advice - 1 addition: I use thinner chain oils for dry riding, and thicker for when I know it's going to be raining or I'll be going through areas that are wet.

[mugsy]

My go to lubricant for chains is heavy duty motor oil. Most motorcycle companies have it listed as the preferred chain lubricant, sure it's mainly because its kind on the o-rings but you can also just split it into a few different sized bottles and droppers and then use it for everything, even the cleaning. Sure, you get the oil all over the place and need to have the soap ready to go, but it penetrates easily and gets to all the right places, as you use more and more it lifts all the dirt and grime out faster than you think it has any right to and all you need to do after proper cleaning is hang it up for a while, fit and wipe.

I always used proper chain cleaners and what i thought were good lubricants, until i ran out of lubricant after i had used the chain cleaner and instead used the oil from my old car that i have been using for the chain on my Yamaha as it suggests in the service manual... i could not believe how much crap came out into the oil after i had used my $47 chain cleaner... I never went back and because i have 3 vehicles and 2 mowers, i never run out either.

[cj]

This point may have been made - winter, road salt and sparing lube application to inside of chain can lead to rusty chain. During winter I apply a bit more coating on the chain during winter to avoid this - and clean & dry and lube the chain more regularly