For the love of your chain

thecycleclinic

For the love of your drive train buy a chain wear indicator, if you use campag buy a vernier and follow there instructions.

We see alot of bikes with shagged drivetrains. Regardless of whether you do your own maintainence or hand the bike over you need to monitor chain wear to know it needs replacing.

With campag chains I religiously replace the chain when it reaches there wear limit as I know from experience if I leave it I ruin cassettes quickly. With kmc chains they get replaced at the 0.5% wear mark to maximise chainset and chainring life.

It does not matter if you have a cheap or expensive bike chain wear indicators save drive trains. I know there is a crowd who insist on measuring with a ruler like it's a spiritual thing but it's also not necessary. For all people measuring in the above ways is sufficient to avoid wrecking cassettes and chainring before there time. Chainging chains a bit early maximise the life of other drivetrain parts.

Chains are consumable.

Also keep them clean. Please keep them clean. A clean chain lasts longer. Lubricants that pick up crude do have a habit of wearing your drivetrain quicker than lubricants that pick up less crude.

For the love of your chain take care of it. If you can afford a 5 grand bike you can also afford a chain wear indicator. If you can afford a pint at a pub you can afford a chain wear indicator.

darkhairedlord

thecycleclinic said:

For the love of your drive train buy a chain wear indicator, if you use campag buy a vernier and follow there instructions..........................

What are the instructions?

veronese68

Wise words, I left mine a bit too long through the winter so made a decision to just leave it knowing I will have to replace the cassette. Not too worried as it's only a 105 so not silly money. I tend to keep a spare chain and cassette in stock anyway.
I was wondering if that applied to Campag chains or geartrain. Do you have to use Campag chains? I only have old Nuovo Record of theirs which is not as fussy as modern stuff.
I found this which goes into lots of detail, it says use the internal measurement on a vernier and compare new to worn.
https://cyclingtips.com/2019/08/bicycle-chain-wear-and-checking-for-it/

pblakeney

veronese68 said:

I was wondering if that applied to Campag chains or geartrain. Do you have to use Campag chains? I only have old Nuovo Record of theirs which is not as fussy as modern stuff.

I have been using mostly KMC on Chorus and Athena 11 speed for years.

thecycleclinic

darkhairedlord said:

thecycleclinic said:

For the love of your drive train buy a chain wear indicator, if you use campag buy a vernier and follow there instructions..........................

What are the instructions?

Read the booklet that comes with you campagnolo chain. In there between 6 outer link the length should be no more than 132.6mm. This does jot work on other chain though. It equates for a campag chain to about 0.5% wear. 0.5% wear on other chain is higher number.

I have used and do use kmc chajn on my campag 10 and 11 speed drive train. Wear life is shorter and the is a bit more noise. So it makes sense only with the kmc x12 chains. The more expensive KFC's are no cheaper than a record chain, dont last as long and result in more noise.

fatted864

Do you need to use the Campag UT-CN300 Chain Tool with Campag chains?

pblakeney

I use quick links with zero problems.
Biggest issue is with Campagnolo instructions. The use of "...may cause accidents, physical injury and death." in nearly every paragraph is a bit OT legal protection.

shortfall

fatted864 said:

Do you need to use the Campag UT-CN300 Chain Tool with Campag chains?

I bought a tool off eBay that cost about a tenner and does the same job. I use kmc and Campagnolo chains and in my experience they're equally good. YMMV

masjer

I agree with swapping chains early to avoid wear (on new/er components) but not scrapping them. When chainrings / cassettes / chains become part worn (0.5%-0.75%), I just reuse the whole set on my winter bike. My last 3 chains (shimano 105) lasted 9000 miles each (when regularly rotated) on the same cassette (27000 miles) without any problems. I use boil wax so the chain wear rate is low. If all parts are already part worn it's free motoring.
The chains won't skip on the cassette if regularly rotated.
For me, the best way to measure chain wear is to remove the chain, hang in from a nail along with a new chain. This gives a visual indication of chain wear along the whole length of the chain and ignores the issue of roller wear that most chain gauges don't account for.

davebradswmb

This page advises that a Campagnolo chain should not be removed unnecessarily, and it's a costly operation anyway as you need to buy a new pin. It also warns that you must use their tool or else the chain will break. I recently changed to Campagnolo chains on both my bikes, 9 speed on one and 11 speed on the other, and bought myself a special Lezyne chain tool which claims to be able to pein the pin on the 11 speed chain, and it seems to have done a good job.

coopster_the_1st

10k miles on my last chain before changing it. Drive train perfectly fine with the new chain which is now a few thousand miles old.

The hobby is cycling, not measuring chain wear, or regularly changing or cleaning chains. I don't have time for OCD in my cycling hobby.

cruff

coopster_the_1st said:

10k miles on my last chain before changing it. Drive train perfectly fine with the new chain which is now a few thousand miles old.

The hobby is cycling, not measuring chain wear, or regularly changing or cleaning chains. I don't have time for OCD in my cycling hobby.

You got 10,000 miles out of a chain? Do you weigh five kilos, ride exclusively in a vacuum sealed room and have an FTP of about 20 watts? 😳

coopster_the_1st

cruff said:

coopster_the_1st said:

10k miles on my last chain before changing it. Drive train perfectly fine with the new chain which is now a few thousand miles old.

The hobby is cycling, not measuring chain wear, or regularly changing or cleaning chains. I don't have time for OCD in my cycling hobby.

You got 10,000 miles out of a chain? Do you weigh five kilos, ride exclusively in a vacuum sealed room and have an FTP of about 20 watts? 😳

Summer bike so was generally only ridden in good, dry conditions. It was dragging 85kg+ around the Chilterns so plenty of steep stuff.

I'm sure the chain would have failed a wear indicator after 1 or 2k but it was running fine. Changed it at 10k because I could feel the wear on it (started to lose its smooth feel under pressure)

N0bodyOfTheGoat

Feeling a bit guilty here for finally replacing the chain and cassette on Sunday, after the old ones had been on there for ~20 months of dry (and more indoor riding than I would have liked), approx 7000 miles...

I need to double check, but I think the 50T chainring teeth might be a bit worn, had a few "crunch" noise moments when putting down feable MAMIL peak-ish power (think sub 800W). Sub 600W seemed absolutely solid on the 34T ring earlier, which kind of makes sense, because the gradients I've been happy riding in 50/28 have increased over the three years I've had the Cube road bike.

pblakeney

N0bodyOfTheGoat said:

...because the gradients I've been happy riding in 50/28 have increased over the three years I've had the Cube road bike.

Crossing the chain isn't a good idea, especially at high watts.

N0bodyOfTheGoat

pblakeney said:

N0bodyOfTheGoat said:

...because the gradients I've been happy riding in 50/28 have increased over the three years I've had the Cube road bike.

Crossing the chain isn't a good idea, especially at high watts.

28 was my second largest cog on that 11-32, which I thought was ok?

New cassette is 11-34, which is great for climbing gear sprockets...
11-13-15-17-19-21-24-27-30-34

pblakeney

50/28 = 34/19 which would be straighter, more efficient and wear cogs & chains less.
Crossover on your new cassette will be 50/24 & 34/17.

DeVlaeminck

If I'm doing decent mileage I tend to get a new chain when I get the best bike out in Spring. Keep it reasonably clean then maybe 3k miles on it I reckon it should be about ready for replacing. I have got a chain checker somewhere though.

brundonbianchi

I’m careful to change the 12 speed chains on my best bike as soon as they hit 12-1/16 inches over 12 links. Much more than that and they risk killing the cassettes, and given the cost of the cassettes compared to the chains, it’s a no brainer. I’ll quite happily let the chains on my old 10 speed commuter / winter / station hack go to 12-1/8, as the cassettes don’t cost so much.

darkhairedlord

brundonbianchi said:

I’m careful to change the 12 speed chains on my best bike as soon as they hit 12-1/16 inches over 12 links. Much more than that and they risk killing the cassettes, and given the cost of the cassettes compared to the chains, it’s a no brainer. I’ll quite happily let the chains on my old 10 speed commuter / winter / station hack go to 12-1/8, as the cassettes don’t cost so much.

How many 12sp chains have gotten through then?

webboo

Given his alleged mileage in the past about one a week.

brundonbianchi

darkhairedlord said:

brundonbianchi said:

I’m careful to change the 12 speed chains on my best bike as soon as they hit 12-1/16 inches over 12 links. Much more than that and they risk killing the cassettes, and given the cost of the cassettes compared to the chains, it’s a no brainer. I’ll quite happily let the chains on my old 10 speed commuter / winter / station hack go to 12-1/8, as the cassettes don’t cost so much.

How many 12sp chains have gotten through then?

I’m on my second, in 3 months.

brundonbianchi

webboo said:

Given his alleged mileage in the past about one a week.

Thankfully, I’m on an easy year ( due to Covid mostly) and only using the ‘best bike’ sparingly.

yellowv2

Never misses the opportunity to everyone about his new "Best Bike" either!

darkhairedlord

brundonbianchi said:

darkhairedlord said:

brundonbianchi said:

I’m careful to change the 12 speed chains on my best bike as soon as they hit 12-1/16 inches over 12 links. Much more than that and they risk killing the cassettes, and given the cost of the cassettes compared to the chains, it’s a no brainer. I’ll quite happily let the chains on my old 10 speed commuter / winter / station hack go to 12-1/8, as the cassettes don’t cost so much.

How many 12sp chains have gotten through then?

I’m on my second, in 3 months.

So you've only changed a 12sp chain once then?

jafaarfathiiXifcz8_9

What kind of Lubricants do you recommend? is it really important?

pblakeney

jafaarfathiiXifcz8_9 said:

What kind of Lubricants do you recommend? is it really important?

Yes it is important. The choice is vast though. Do your own research.
I'd recommend using the search function for "lubricant".

Charlie_Croker

What pb said ^
It's important to clean your chain on a regular basis too