The key to a well lubed chain, where I ride in the Bay Area, is not what kind of lube I use, but rather how often I lube the chain. Many companyies claim to be the BEST LUBE, but if your chain is running dry just 45 minutes into a dusty ride, what good is that. I keep a Tri-Flow container refilled with motor oil (Mobil 1, of course) in my camelback. I relube 1 or 2 times DURING my ride. Is motor oil a poor chain lube? Yes. Is using it better than running a chain dry? Yes. Motor oil is cheap and I can use lots of it without discression and pass it around to my buddies on the ride. I do prefer Tri-Flow in general and will use it on my road bike and in the shop.
I am currently looking into what low cost chain lube alternatives exist. US Tsubaki has viscosity recomendations HERE. Basically for temperatures between 40-100F, a 20-30 wt. gear oil should be used. Most probably a low viscosity chainsaw bar & chain lube with only slight anti-fling qualities:
Exxon Chain Oil 22: ISO 21
76 Special Bar and Chain Oil. ISO 68
Pennzoil Bar and Chain Oil: ISO 83
Amsoil Semi-Synthetic Bar and Chain Oil: SAE30Green Oil Company: Chainsaw Oil and Bicycle Oil (Biodegradable)
SoilSafe by Eastern Agriforest Ltd.: Chainsaw Bar Lubricant (Biodegradable)
GB Lubricants and Fuels: GB Biodegradable Chainsaw Fluid (Biodegradable) ISO 68
AMSOIL: Synthetic TBI Hydraulic Oil (Semi-biodegradable) ISO 32Also Tribology roller chain oil.
TriFlow is a Sherwin Williams product. A data sheet for this product can be found HERE. #26020 is a gallon size. I knew it had to exist! If you use a lot of TriFlow, your can order it HERE.
Oil of Rohloff by the famous german maker.
See Sheldon Brown's artical on chains, HERE. Jonathan Levy goes nuts on chains HERE. The American Chain Association has several publications available for the super geeks among us.
The best way to clean a chain is to soak it in kerosene. This requires removal from the bike. If you are running a Shimano Hyperglide chain, you will not want to do this. Any other form of cleaning is based on the slurry method. This is done by thinning the grit out of the system rather than cleaning it out. For lack of anything better, the Park Cyclone tool works well.
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