On Thu, 15 Nov 2018 12:01:57 -0500, Frank Krygowski
wrote:

On 11/15/2018 9:45 AM, sms wrote:
On 11/14/2018 10:36 AM, jbeattie wrote:

snip

I've used both -- and think they suck.* Hot wax is too much work as
are leather saddles in a wet environment.* My old Ideal 90 was growing
mold-fur, and my Brooks was never comfortable. I was always a plastic
saddle guy.

I have tried hot was. I came to the same conclusion as all the experts:

-----
"When wax was popular, we'd get customers coming in all the time
complaining about shifting problems on their bikes. Removed the wax and
lubed with conventional stuff and voila, shifting back to normal." Mike
Jacoubowsky, co-owner of Chain Reaction Bicycles.

"Wax is not mobile and cannot return to a location from which it has
been removed by rotation of one part on another." Jobst Brandt, author
of The Bicycle Wheel

"If you use dry lube or wax, follow product directions and use it often.
In some cases, dry lube should be used for every ride. It wears off very
quickly and no new lube can flow to the critical wear areas." Craig
Metalcraft, manufacturer of Super Link III.

"Downsides of the wax approach include the fact that it is a great deal
of trouble, and that wax is probably not as good a lubricant as oil or
grease." Sheldon Brown

Yawn. Typical Scharf. No data, just decades-old speculation and opinions.

Links to relevant data have been given here many times. Sharf (AKA
"sms") refuses to read them.

For example, from
https://www.bikeradar.com/us/news/ar...iciency-35694/

"Smith has used that data to develop his own 'UltraFast' chain, which is
essentially the fastest chain he's tested (Shimano's Dura-Ace CN-7901)
ultrasonically cleaned and treated with a blend of paraffin wax, pure
PTFE, and molybdenum sulfide lubricants. This recipe produces, Smith
says, provides the lowest consistently measureable frictional losses of
everything he’s tested."

Other sources give similar results for pure paraffin wax, and show that
chain life is longest with a paraffin wax based lubricant.

What I have NOT tried is wax mixed with oil or other wet lube. I suspect
that this would work because the oil is mobile, but leaving out the wax
would make it work as well.

IME, the only downside of pure paraffin is that it squeaks after rain.
It actually keeps the drivetrain cleaner than wax plus a bit of oil. But
the addition of maybe 5% oil removes the squeak-after-rain problem, and
it still keeps the chain, cogs, chainwheels and bike FAR cleaner than
any ordinary oil lubricant.

BTW, this is why the "cleaning the bike" thread is uninteresting to me.
My bikes are rarely dirty enough to need attention. When I clean them,
I'm usually just wiping off road dust. I do that with a paper towel
soaked in Pledge spray-on wax.

I really wonder about the reference to difficult shifting as I've used
wax on bikes that had (1) down tube friction shifters, (2) Shimano
Brifters, and (3) both indexed and friction bar end shifters, and
frankly I never noticed any difficulties in shifting with any shifter
system.

But in thinking about it, I would suggest that if it did make shifting
difficult it is probably because the wax, having penetrated the links
and rollers of the chain, that the chain is now stiffer, more rigid,
then a chain that is not wax lubricated.


--

Cheers,

John B.