If you have waxed a chain and you want to go back to lube can you just lube the chain or do you need to clean it first?
@Jonathan
I have had a slightly different experience in waxing a chain for the first time and I wanted to share as I thought I did something wrong.
I was starting with a brand new chain.
When I started with minerals spirits bath, nothing happened, that mineral spirits stayed clear and no grease appeared to come out of the chain. I still did a few baths but same result.
I proceeded to baths in 99% isopropyl alcohol and grease started to come out. I did a few baths until it stayed clear.
I then proceeded to waxing.
I was puzzled why mineral spirits seemed like an unnecessary step.
Fast forward to today and I am doing my second waxing.
I put the chain in boiling water (just in a jar I poured the boiling water as I don’t have a pot to ruin yet).
I wiped the chain clean with a rag.
I proceeded to try mineral spirits again and shazam, it was stripping out a lot of grease.
What is different now from before?
Does a brand new chain require a bit of break in before you can get the grease out with mineral spirits?
The chain is sitting in mineral spirits overnight and I will proceed to an isopropyl alcohol bath(s) tomorrow, before re-waxing.
I thought I would share in case anyone else had a similar experience.
Happy waxing.
Not sure I understand you correctly. Is this the same chain? In which case, off course it would react differently. The first time, it had factory grease on it (a special sticky grease). The second time, it had wax on it. Wax is not grease.
If it’s two different chains, the factory grease might be different.
The wax I use I purchased from the local grocery store labeled: Gulf Wax Household Parafin Wax (for canning, candlemaking and many other uses). You can buy it (or similar) on Amazon but it is about 1/3rd the price if you buy it in your local grocery store. The wax comes in a hard cake, about six cakes to a box. Cost about $3.00 US or so. Don’t use liquid parafin wax. It won’t work for waxing chains.
The PTFE I use is:
It works well however it is kind of sticky (clings to itself readily) and settles to the bottom of the wax pot after the wax melts. So you have to swish your chain around in the bottom of the pot to get to the PTFE.
I also used this stuff:
I don’t add any molybdenum disulfide as I don’t believe it’s necessary plus it leaves a gray residue on anything it touches and kind of defeats the purpose of having a “clean” chain that isn’t grimmy or leaves a residue. My opinion though. You may want to add it as it’s used in Molton Speed Wax. You can purchase it on Amazon as well.
To clean a chain that hasn’t been waxed before (brand new or one you’ve been riding on for a while) I follow the directions and chemicals from OZ Cycling on YouTube. If one follows his
directions, it does the job perfectly.
First I turn on my small oval crock pot and add the wax. I use this one:
I turn on the crock pot on high until the wax disolves - takes about a half hour or so, maybe a bit longer, then switch to low. I use a kitchen thermometer to bring the temperature of the wax to about 200 degrees F. Once the wax is melted I add the PTFE in a 50 to 1 ratio.
I start with immersing the chain in a small amount of gasoline just enough to cover the chain in a small covered container. I rinse the chain two or three times until the last chain bath is relatively clean, followed by a bath in mineral spirits (a couple baths if necessary), then denatured alcohol. After rinsing in denatured alcohol I blow the chain dry with an air hose, then let it dry on a hanger for a couple hours. I then swish it around in the crock pot making sure to swish it through the PTFE which seems to sink to the bottom of the crock pot. Naturally, I found out, that the chain is pretty hot when you bring it out of the wax bath.
It doesn’t take long for the newly waxed chain to cool down. I then run the chain over a wooden dowell or piece of small plastic pipe to loosen up the links.
Occasionally one of the chain link ends will loose one of the bearings in the bottom of the wax bath. You may have to dig it out. I now wrap the last links of the chain with a paper clip.
I use the Connex links as they’re reusable and, with a little effort, go on and off fairly easily. I also dip these in the wax bath. I use these, they’re a little spendy:
Woops, looks like Amazon is out of stock. You can buy directly from Connex for about the same price though. But you get the picture.
For the next waxing I rinse the chain in hot water using a hot water pot and a sink screen:
and
I rinse the chain in hot water a couple times, air blow dry, then re-wax. There’s no need to go through all the cleaning process with gasoline, mineral spirits, and denatured alcohol again as the chain stays clean on the inside of the roller bearings. You just need to rinse off the small amount of road grime that attaches to the wax on your chain. Rewaxing takes considerable than having to clean a new or used chain for the first time. Just reheat the wax in your crock pot, wait until it reaches temperature, swish it around a bit, and you’re done. Much easier the second time around.
I rewax my chain about every 150 miles (250Km) or so. If you ride in the rain, maybe more often.
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Long-time petroleum chain lube rider; first-time waxer.
As I have proven, long-term deficiencies in the kitchen and/or laboratory, here’s my process: ICE Friction Technology
Referenced in podcast with MTB racer Alex Wild here.
So after doing both, I’ve kind of come down on running wax in the summer, wet lube in the winter. Rain just strips wax instantly, so it’s not tenable all year here. I can see people in arid climes running wax 24/7 though.
I’ve found it interesting that most WT teams generally run wet lube still, TT’s being the exception. It makes sense though, as long as the chains are constantly maintained, it seems the way to go for turning over a lot of bikes daily for the mechanics.
For me, the lack of cleaning in summer is far and away the biggest upside of waxing. once you get to rainy season, it’s flips back to wet lube.
2 Likes
Two years of people Nerding out on waxing a bicycle chain ?. OMG… I’ve read it all… and still have things to add and ask 
I’ve come from the inspirational OZ Cycles YT Vids.
These are great but as he’s moved on there’s some overlapping and added methods which can leave you confused.
Wax additives.
I been waxing for a year and I’m currently on a batch of added PTFE powder. I’m enjoying the difference of a very clean and fast drivetrain as apposed to just wax. .
I read with interest the Friction Facts test on the True Tension Tungsten lube. He rated it and said it was good for reducing DT wear.
Has any tried adding WS2 or Tungsten Disulphide powder to their wax ? I’ve Googled the poop out of this and and came up with a chap saying it sank to the bottom of the crock pot and needed additional agitation to mix. Anyone ?
Northern Latitude/ Colder Climates
I’m London Lat 51.5…It’s cold and wet here ALOT. I’ve experimented with adding Paraffin Lamp Oil. Just enough to soften the mix. It works by adding a film that seems to combat wet conditions and not producing rust. It does mean more attraction of dirt and sooner re application but allows it to be used in wetter conditions. It needs an additional IPA wash to get it clean after boiling water before the next re wax but seems to allow Winter use of wax lube.
Any one want to put their thoughts?
New to waxing but still not ready to go the crock pot route. Instead I started using squirt wax chain lube. When do you know it is time to clean the waxed chain? I am starting to see black waxy flakes coming out from the chain. is this normal for a waxed chain? Is this a sign to take off the the chain to give it a through cleaning and re-waxing? (degreasing > spirits > wax)
With squirt, I’ve only ever wiped it down with warm water (along with the bike), dried it by running through a cloth, and then re-applied squirt. It’s probably better to wipe it down with paraffine oil instead, but I don’t have any.
I’d only go through the whole cleaning cycle if cleaning it as above doesn’t work anymore. Think so far, I’ve usually just changed the chain.
Still not got round to proper hot wax, but just found liquid wax from Morgan blue, so giving that a try. Two dry 65 mile rides so far, and been ok. Chain seems to attract more dirt than with Squirt, bht the reviews said it also lasts longer, so lets see…
I know Squirt is wax based but from a waxing experience Squirt is apples and oranges from actual crock pot waxing.
There is a whole Squirt lube thread - Squirt Lube - what am I doing wrong?
IMHO - I didn’t like Squirt, but crock pot chain waxing is the bees knees (weather contingent)
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I came here to ask almost the same question. I was waxing last year, good success and good longevity, chains did alright in the wet. I bought some new wax which was very ‘white’ - the old beads were more yellow. I thought this would be an improvement as it must be more pure.
Since changing batches I’ve noticed the wax is very brittle, it seems to all flake off straight away. The chain goes orange if left even slightly wet, and if I get caught in the rain it’ll sound horrible. All of these things are new with the new batch of wax. The last one was more resilient, and seemed to cling on more (leaving a waxy residue on the jockey wheels for instance which the new one doesn’t).
I was thinking of adding something (maybe white spirit?) to the mix to soften the wax as it seems too hard. Anyone had similar issues and solved them? Thanks,
alexgold123
https://www.trainerroad.com/forum/u/alexgold123
September 2
Roy07775:
Northern Latitude/ Colder Climates
I’m London Lat 51.5…It’s cold and wet here ALOT. I’ve experimented
with adding Paraffin Lamp Oil. Just enough to soften the mix. It works
by adding a film that seems to combat wet conditions and not producing
rust. It does mean more attraction of dirt and sooner re application but
allows it to be used in wetter conditions. It needs an additional IPA
wash to get it clean after boiling water before the next re wax but
seems to allow Winter use of wax lube.
Any one want to put their thoughts?
I came here to ask almost the same question. I was waxing last year,
good success and good longevity, chains did alright in the wet. I bought
some new wax which was very ‘white’ - the old beads were more yellow. I
thought this would be an improvement as it must be more pure.
Since changing batches I’ve noticed the wax is very brittle, it seems to
all flake off straight away. The chain goes orange if left even slightly
wet, and if I get caught in the rain it’ll sound horrible. All of these
things are new with the new batch of wax. The last one was more
resilient, and seemed to cling on more (leaving a waxy residue on the
jockey wheels for instance which the new one doesn’t).
I was thinking of adding something (maybe white spirit?) to the mix to
soften the wax as it seems too hard. Anyone had similar issues and
solved them? Thanks,
Hi Alex,
Have a look at the Oz Cycle YT Vids. How to make your own chain lube.He
talks about using Paraffin Oil and how to add to get the right
consistency.If you’re using just wax with no expensive additives try
doctoring your current batch. If it goes wrong chuck it out and start
again with a fresh batch.
During the depths of winter last year I siphoned some off into a small
old Muc Off oil bottle.I put the bottle in a pot of hot water to make it
very runny and applied it like a oil lube.When set i partially cleaned
the excess wax off leaving some on the outer plates.Yes it got dirty
quickly but wet riding wasn’t an issue.
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Hi Roy, I’d gone by the Oz Cycle videos originally, and that (his new video with a ‘better’ formula) was what prompted me to change to just wax and PTFE. I may have added something to the initial wax (as he said to before) but it definitely wasn’t lamp oil, as I’ve never had any! I’ve bought some now so will try that and report back. The current mix is definitely night and day different to the first mix (in a bad way) so I can’t make it any worse by adding something…
Has anyone experienced an increase in dropped chains? Prior to this season i used Squirt for several years, never had a problem. This season i had chronic chain drops all year long on two bikes, both having a YBN & SRAM chains with Molten Speed wax (I swap them out every 250-ish miles)
F%@&# SRAM
No, but then again my bike is 1x 
After fresh waxing, the chain is a little lumpy for a few dozen rotations and needs to be done under load (ie, not back-peddling). Once the excess wax flakes off, it’s gtg. But I wonder if maybe the wax slightly increases the width of the outer chain links so sometimes the FD pushes it just a touch too far? Maybe dial the limit screws in a tiny tiny bit?
No, but I do know shifting changes as the wax thins out on the chain.
I know if I have my FD dialled with exactly the minimum amount of outward movement to change to the big ring, with a waxed chain after 100km or so, that won’t be enough to change to the big ring with a freshly waxed chain.
HTH
PS I have YBN, SRAM and Wipperman chains.
Not only that, but with pure paraffin, the cassette gets sticky as wax residue builds up. Campy shifting is smooth and Ultrashift is rapidfire fast… but I did notice a degradation and lag in shifting over time with a waxed chain due to the stickiness. I also found the flakes annoying.
Don’t have the same issue with Tungsten All Weather (which is better than both Smoove and Squirt). My crockpot’s done its dash… Tungsten moving forward. So quick and easy with better performance than hot wax.
NB: I used pure food-grade, commercially sourced paraffin wax from a company that makes it in-house on an industrial scale. 1kg bag of pellets for AU$15. I wanted this to be good, but it just wasn’t.
i get the paraffin build up on my cassette, but i havent noticed reduced shift quality. I take the cassette off every3 months or so and clean it anyway