I ask because I honestly haven’t paid that much attention but recently realized I probably should. I swap between my two chains twice a month and reuse the same quicklink for most of the past year and haven’t had any issues 
I reuse sram quicklinks, but not that often. Maybe 3-4 times over the lifetime of the chain.
Really find it interesting that there are so different experiences with squirt. Wonder if its down to temperature, or something else. For me it always dries completely overnight, and it isn’t sticky, just a slightly waxy feel. It also doesn’t gunk up at all.
The temperature here in the UK is mostly between 5-20 deg C, and humidity somewhere over 60%.
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The waxy feel was how it felt after drying, so same experience there. But once sprayed down with water, it was quite tacky. A new experience for me for drip-on lubes of any kind.
Repeated again tonight after a seriously muddy ride, spray down, blow-dry, and same tacky feel. Wiped chain pretty firmly with microfiber rag and tacky feel went away. Felt like dry chain. Reapplied Squirt and it appears to be drying nicely by the fan. I suspect I’ll be back to waxy feel tomorrow morning.
But who knows what the pins and rollers are like on the inside. 
My chain and drivetrain never looks dirty. After application you must wipe the chain and drivetrain excessively, to include the chainring and jockey wheels.
How many miles or hours of ride time do you go between application of the lube and the next wipe-down and re-lube?
I’ve reused a kmc quick link at least a dozen times w/o trouble (just one data point fwiw)
Joe
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After each ride, which is 2-4 hours. I generally do a full wash of the bike (drivetrain) at the end of every week.
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Whoever thinks waxing is a hassle, I swear that’s nothing compared to trying to keep a greasy drivetrain clean! I’m going back to waxing as soon as this chain needs to be replaced.
Any bad experiences with an initial hot wax bath and maintenance done with a drip lube for the remainder of the chain’s useful life? I won’t be taking it off after it’s installed.
Edit: It’s a road bike ridden in dry conditions unless the unexpected happens.
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If you use something like Silca Hot Melt or MSW and then top up with a similar formula (such as Silca Super Secret Drip) I’m sure you’d have great results. Topping a waxed chain with something like Rock N Roll GOLD seems like a terrible idea and a waste of initial waxing
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Oh yes, I meant wax-based lube, only applied through dripping after the initial preparation rather than bathing.
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Totally cool. Silca actually designed theirs to be separate products but also to work together as a treatment and maintenance pair
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I got a KMC DLC11 chain with the blue highlighting a couple years ago, and I found that the blue paint began to flake off after a couple cleanings. Does anybody have experience on how to effectively clean those chains for waxing without taking the paint off?
I put a freshly waxed chain on the night prior to Unbound gravel. At the first check point everything was ok, about mile 125 it started to make noise when i went into my 42. Mile 155 I put some squirt lube on the chain and never had an issue the rest of the ride.
Conditions were dusty, 5 creek crossing and I ended up with some mud on the wheels, I was pleased with the product after 205 miles.
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After listening to the latest LT100 podcast, I’m on the wax train again - besides Icefriction, are there any shops that sell race-ready waxed chains?
Got a 12sp SRAM on my XC MTB, but they said that the Campagnolo Record would work as well, so hoping to find that one waxed somewhere.
I have experimented with various levels of post-drip-lube wiping/cleaning of the drive train. From “mostly clean looking” to “anyone on the planet would consider this excessive”… as in: I’m trying to get every last bit of lube and grime off any external surface, including spinning the chain for 100+ revolutions while wiping with clean rags.
I notice that there is a point where more wiping actually results in a very slightly louder chain. Not grinding or clicking, just that the rollers can be more audibly heard contacting the casette and pully wheels, as compared to “pretty darn clean, but not excessive” level wiping, post-drip-lube-application.
Have you experienced this?
Is it supposed to sound like that? My inclination is no, because sound means impact and impact means higher friction… in my small brain.
Thoughts?
I have some questions on @Jonathan’s original post that I haven’t seen addressed. If anyone could answer I’d be appreciative!
If using half a jar of mineral spirits per bath, and using 6-8 baths per chain, am I understanding that you’re using upwards of half a gallon of mineral spirits per chain, per stripping?
The cheapest mineral spirits I can find are $12.44 / gallon. This appears to be quite costly over the life of a chain. Am I doing something wrong? (I did multiple chains at once in a sequence of 6 jars with positive results, but it still seems like I’m burning money on mineral spirits if I’ll be doing this often.
I could be wrong but mineral spirits aren’t water soluble, at least by my hand-rinsing attempt. What is the purpose and effect of the water rinse?
How do you dry the chain after rinsing with water? Any concern for rust or do you get it dry pretty quickly? If so, how!? (I live in the PNW some of the year and it seems like even in my house a wet chain could stay wet long enough to rust if I don’t have a direct source of air flow on it, or crank up the furnace to uncomfy-warm.
ZFC
Seems excessive, but to each their own. 2 or 3 baths usually does it to my satisfaction. And I try not to use much more solvent than required to cover the chain. I will let them soak for a while (hours; days if I’m lazy)
Gasoline is cheaper and plenty effective in my experience.
I might be misunderstanding, but you only strip the oem grease when the chain is brand new. Also, if you give it time to settle you can usually reuse the solvent. This would be a problem if you do a lot of chains all at once, but if you can stretch it out over a few weeks, say 1 chain/wk. If you’re feeling frisky 
and have a centrifuge the separation can happen much faster.
Right, not sure if there’s a point in rinsing – unless you proceed to ultrasonic-clean the chain. That means some kind of water-based bath.
I recommend an air compressor to blow the water out/off. This won’t dry it 100, but good enough as I’ll usually proceed to waxing after this.
Otherwise, outside in the heat/sun outside will finish it off. Or else, bring it inside maybe wrapped in a towel overnight. Rust is always a concern, but its generally very very superficial as long as it dries fairly quickly. Its chain that are wet for days where you get problems.
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No need for water-washing the chain for that - just keep it in a jar of solvent, put the jar into the ultrasonic bath, filled with water.
Agree it’s superficial, but I’ve had a chain rust in less than two hours, one of which was the drive home from a race (with the bike on top of the car, so plenty of air). So now, if it’s that wet, I just wipe the chain as dry as I can, and re-lube with squirt instantely.
For full dryness, you could put the chain in front of a fan, or in the oven (though maybe not if it’s full of solvents).
Yes, same experience. Wet lube means attracting dirt/sand for MTB which that’s worse than noise. It’s a mechanical device, the drivetrain, so although we may like/want a silent chain it may not be practical. Especially considering MTB and duration. As long as the chain is as clean as you can get it and lubed we’re really getting down to the marginal of marginal gains, so best not to obsess over it.