I wipe the chain down most evenings and relube maybe once a week, and by the following weekend there's visible surface rust on the rollers and the plates. Riding about 15km a day on roads they salt heavily from December. It still shifts fine but it looks awful and I assume it's wearing fast. Do people just accept this in winter or is there a routine that actually works?
Buy two or three cheap chains and rotate them every few hundred km, cleaning the off ones properly indoors in a jar of degreaser. Winter chains are consumables. I treat a chain as a 2000km winter item and don't feel bad about it.
Rotating also evens out the wear on the cassette, so you get more life out of the expensive part. Quick link makes the swap a two minute job.
Rinsing the bike matters more than the chain. Salt sits in the bottom bracket shell, the chainstay bridge, and behind the brake calipers, and that's where the expensive corrosion happens. Two minutes with a watering can once a week beats detailing the chain.
Some people run a dedicated winter bike, and if you can find a cheap frame it's the low-effort answer. I do 4 months a year on a beater and the good bike doesn't see salt at all.
@two_stroke_tess · last mo. · 3 replies
Wiping isn't the problem, lube choice is. Salt water is being flung into the chain constantly and a dry or ceramic wax lube has nothing to keep it out. In salt you want a proper wet lube — thick, oily, attracts grit, looks filthy, keeps water off the metal. Yes it collects black gunge. That's the trade.
Routine that works for me from December to March, 20km a day on salted roads:
Surface rust on the plates is cosmetic and doesn't matter much. Rust in the rollers and pins is what actually kills a chain, and that's what the wet lube prevents.
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@carbon_steel_kit · last mo.
Switched to a wet lube in January. Filthy chain, zero orange, and it's the first winter the shifting hasn't gone gritty by February.
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@printbed_gremlin · last mo.
The morning wipe is the step everyone skips. Oil on the outside just glues salt and grit to the chain.
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