I have always used a the Park chain wear gauge to decide when to replace chains. When bought a new bike with a Campy 11-speed drivetrain I was told that the gauge would never show wear on the Campy chain and I should replace it every 2500 miles. I recently started to use a gold KMC chain and was wondering if using the chain gauge on this chain was appropriate of if I should adhere to the 2500 mile rule of thumb.

I have the park guage and KMC's own digital guage and guess what the two are always in agreement and the park one is quicker and easier to use. Works on 6 to 11 speed systems fine. Personally I always bin my chains at 75% elongation, Even the KMC gold SL are much cheaper than new cogs. having said that, using Rock n Roll blue lube and never degreasing, my chains are always lasting nearer > 4000 miles. Current one has done 2000 miles and is at 25% wear

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Cervelo S3 2011. Blinged 6.718 Kg

Campag chains can be and should be checked using standard methods. I also use Rock n roll lub and never dregrease my chains. +1 on that.

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www.thecycleclinic.co.uk

Have always used Prolink Gold lube. Never heard of Rock and Roll lube. Is it that much better than Prolink?

That lube is fine, just use plenty of it and then wipe down after each ride. DO NOT DEGREASE EVER.

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Cervelo S3 2011. Blinged 6.718 Kg

None of the wear gages mentioned actually measures elongation or the change in pitch of the chain. Elongation is properly measured with a 12 inch, or longer, precision rule so you're only measuring the wear on the pins and bushings formed into the inner side plates.

Campy chains wear differently than most other brands, with very little elongation, but similar amounts of roller wear. Chain wear gages typically measure only over a 5-6 inch length. Over that short length, the wear on the rollers on each end of the measured length can be as much as all of the pins and bushings, so the reported wear can be twice the actual elongation, unless the manufacturer of the gage has put in a "fudge factor" for roller wear. Campy suggest using calipers, measuring over a 5.200 inch length, and replacing the chain when that length increases to 5.220 inch. If you do that, you'll get a little over half of the chain's useable life.

A chain with little elongation, but lots of roller wear can still cause new-chain skip. I've used a Campy 10 chain for 6,000 miles and accurately measured .15% elongation, over the full length of the chain. Was that chain still useable? NO! It should have been tossed long before, due to the roller and side wear. The roller spacing had increased from it's original .200 inch to .235-.240 and the side clearance was nearly twice that of a new chain.

Most brands will wear such that the elongation reaches .5% around the time that the rollers are getting well-worn, so using a proper measurement of the change in chain pitch will tell you when to change that chain.

As for never degreasing a chain, that's nonsense. After only a few rides, the only thing inside a chain is dirty, gritty lube that increases the wear rate of the chain. Removing the dirty lube and replacing it with clean lube can only improve chain life. The Campy chain that I used for 6,000 miles with .15% elongation was degreased and relubed many times.

Chains shouldn't be degreased. Sais KMC among others. Once degreased, that chain will never be greased properly again. Degreasing chains is a big nonsense indeed.

Hi,



Maybe those making such wild and unfounded claims should degrease their chains and look at what comes out of it?

KMC chains that are thoroughly degreased easily become noisy when not properly regreased, that much is true. If you do not degrease a brandnew chain (and again KMC states you do not need to.....) it will contain all the original protective hard wax coating (protective against salty contaminants during shipping, etc. that is) and will never be lubed as it should be.

Sure they'd love you to wear out those chains as soon as possible now, won't they?

Oh, and there's no such thing as a miracle lube either. Dirty lube = grinding paste. Period.

Ciao,

P.S. Guess who manufactures this lube? What's that brush for??

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Being a snob is an expensive hobby.

Sorry, fdegrove, there is no getting away from it, chains should not be degreased. One should use a whatever lube one prefers to clean and lube the chain. Never degrease it. Those recommending degreasing are doing a great disservice to the unsuspecting victims.
And I tried practically everything to clean my chains, even ultrasonic baths with various organic solvents and degreasers. And subsequently relubricating using vacuum. Such chain is never againg as qiuet as it should be when properly maintained and it reqiures very short lubing intervals. This is my personal experience.
And you can have good advice from experts on the subject, if only you are willing to listen.

Dave S.,
I appreciate the detail of your reply. I think I have seen your posts on this topic in other forums. I am not quite as expert as the folks here and so I am looking for a relatively easy way to check wear on my KMC chain. Are you suggesting that the Park tool is inadequate since it is too short. I have used it in the past on other chains successfully. If the steel rule is the only answer then can you recommend one that is not too expensive?

Total and utter nonsense. No expert advice here.

An ultrasonic cleaner would certainly do the job and any thin lube will penetrate fully and completely.

I put mimeral spirits into an old water bottle, drop the chain in and shake vigourously. After that, the chain is still swimming in dirty solvent, so another cleaning with fresh solvent is needed. Finishing up with a third cleaning in hot soapy water is optional. If the hot water wash is used, then applying something to displace the water is important. My home brew mix of mineral spirits and synthetic motor oil will do that.

Mineral spirits can be reused many times. Leave the solvent in the water bottle and the dirt will settle to the bottom. Next time, pour clean solvent off the top, into another bottle, for cleaning.

http://www.amazon.com/General-Tools-121 ... B00004T7SR

The easiest way to use the rule, is not measuring center to center, but edge to edge. Place one end of the rule on the edge of a pin. When new, the pin at the opposite end will be covered by the rule. When that pin is exposed by nearly half it's diameter, you've reach .5% elongation.

I get even more chain life by alternating 3-4 chains with one cassette. If you alternate chains, you can still remove a chain at .5% elongation (or .220 inch roller spacing with Campy), but rather than tossing the chain, keep it for more use, later. The purpose of changing chains early is to avoid new-chain skip. If all of the chains in the rotation have similar wear, you'll never get new-chain skip.

Hi,

Similar cleaning and general maintenance procedures as per DaveS here after every ride longer than roughly 30km generally.



Same here. I suppose randomly changing the chain's rotation as you put it back on after a good cleaning also helps increase it's useful life.
It keeps on amazing me how much crapola comes out of a simple chain; even after three subsequent baths of dieseloil, degreaser (some industrial stuff), citrus degreaser, it still leaves dark marks on a rag when you run it through it....

BTW, I'd advise everyone running 11S (regardless of what brand or gruppo) to try the Campa chains. I find them to last much longer than anything else (Connex being probably on par) out there.

Ciao,

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Being a snob is an expensive hobby.

I'm with fdegrove and DaveS.

11sp Campa chains are all I use. I degrease them at minimum once a week, if not more, and get at least 6000km per chain. No rotations.

I do quite a decent amount of km's and also race. Never had issues nor any noise.


Only time I get noise is when it's a new chain or hasn't been cleaned often enough.


Just my .02

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DaveS, Actually your method avoids the reason I say dont degrease chain, your method is fine in that it avoids water

Was watching Muc Off give a commercial cleaning demo yesterday (While I was out cycling with some of the Garmin Sharp and Rapha Condor teams (BLATENT NAME DROP )). Squirt gregreasr on chain, run through scrubber machine, hose degreaser off, spray on lube. Thats what you definately shouldnt do, they now have trapped a ton of water inside the chain and very little lube is in. Also their thick lube will just attract gunk

I personally dont degrease, I just basically almost rinse the chain in Rock N Roll blue, Its a very thin solvent based lube, the solvent washes out a ton of crud anbd then evaporates leaving the lube on. I get great mileage out of the chains and they seem quiet (Hard to tell when you run a RED cassette!).

But yes if you want totally spotless, then bathing in mineral oils, diesel etc works fine and does a great job cleaning, anything that you dont get out is a lube anyway so wont hurt

Maybe the advice would be better at "Dont degrease with anything that needs water to work". Heck even spraying with WD-40 is probably better than the Muc Off method which is what a ton of people use

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Cervelo S3 2011. Blinged 6.718 Kg