Strip new chain grease before lubing with Rock N Roll Gold?

[Gionnirocket]

From what i see she only got 2500mi out of the original chain... Might have been clean but the lube was ehh at best.
Super soy wax is probably best left for hand jobs

 

[PCeBiker]

It keeps getting black with gunk.
It is also depositing black gunk on the rest of the drivetrain.

That's what I'm talking about.

Why deal with that black sticky crap if you simply don't have to.
Why be a slave to chain maintenance that doesn't need to happen.

She is now spoiled from having a chain that always stays perfectly clean.

I don't see myself as being spoiled.
Why would anyone want to deal with a messy inefficient drivetrain if it isn't necessary?

From what i see she only got 2500mi out of the original chain... Might have been clean but the lube was ehh at best.

@PedalUma

Just Deep Clean your chain like you're supposed to, before you hot wax it.

The pros even use ultrasonic immersion cleaning to get it that extra 2%-3% cleaner for Tour De France type applications.

Ask @stompandgo about how the pros Strip the chains before they are waxed, bagged, and sent out to their team members.

Get with the program and clean your damn chain first !!!

 

[PedalUma]

From what i see she only got 2500mi out of the original chain... Might have been clean but the lube was ehh at best.
Super soy wax is probably best left for hand jobs

She got the bike a year ago and rode the Texas hill country all Winter as training with the bike loaded with bikepacking gear. 500 miles per week. She has done the Cascades offroad, gravel Idaho, Montana and the Rockies, Nebraska and more and had it replaced in Davenport at .05. The offroad route is not like an airplane route. On this Summer's ride she has done 2,695 offroad miles and almost 50,000 feet of elevation gains and that is with 41 pounds of camping gear. Everest is 29,200. Now, I am using a mix with mostly paraffin wax. The bio-wax was a N. California hippy appeal thing I tried and it was not as good. I am out for performance for her. That was with a regular ten-speed chain. The new one is a KMC e10. And, yes, boiled in wax for 12-hours. 500 per week for three months over the Winter adds 6,000 miles of hills. Did I just say she rides when loaded?

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Patrice McDonald | Substack

A 72-year-old cyclist crossing America on the Great American Wheel Route.

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[PCeBiker]

Did I just say she rides when loaded?

I never ride drunk.

I do however smoke a little Vado for my rides.

 

[PedalUma]

I would not feel so all alone...

I wrote her a song a bit ago in Nebraska as she left the cowyboy trail:

(A weeping bottleneck slide guitar sets a heavy, syncopated delta groove. A low, mourning blues harp blows a cold wind through the chords.)
Verse 1

The highway wind didn't take him—the shadows just called him back.
Now I’m parsing the mud of Omaha, looking for a missing track.
Got a Taleb barbell balance, an oracle's heavy design,
One foot in the ashes of yesterday, one crossing the blackbird line.
(Slide guitar shivers, mimics a raven’s cry)

Verse 2

The Missouri River’s a serpent, whispering ancient, ink-stained lies,
Telling me how the bloodline bleeds, under these heavy Nebraska skies.
I could turn my back on the magic, head south where the cattle roam,
But a restless heart with a book of life ain't ever gonna find a home.
The hardest choice a witch can make is trying to love a mortal man.
(Blues harp cuts in, short, breathless, and sharp)

Chorus

But the tallgrass hums with a power, waking up the Ravenswood clay,
And every mile is an alchemical dawn, washing his memory away.
This custom steel was forged in Stratford, where the old Bard cast his spell,
It runs on a lightning frequency, right between heaven and hell.
No map, no reins, just a worn-out bedroll against the freezing cold,
Riding a wizard named Prospero, tracking down the secrets untold.

Verse 3

I met a man at the crossroads, his guitar was tuned to the storm,
He asked if I’d trade my higher magic just to keep a cowboy warm.
But this engine runs on current, a wild, intuitive spark,
An electrical wizard flying, casting sigils through the dark.
Eighteen hundred miles of dust, shedding the skin of who I was before,
Leaving the ghost of that cowboy man, knocking on a closed-up door.
(Slide guitar and blues harp collide in an aggressive, dueling jam)

Outro / Climax

The wild things are screaming my name now, out where the tempests reign,
I’m gonna ride this blackbird lightning until I hit the coast of Maine.
Hunting the ultimate freedom that the asphalt couldn't yield...
Just a slide-guitar electric wizard, flying through a gravel field.
(The music strips away until it’s just the raw thumping of a boot on wood, a final ghostly wail of the harmonica, and the fading hiss of an amplifier.)

 

[Gionnirocket]

What's impressive is her will to do it... Though not anything I'd ever be interested in doing.
But if you look at the statistics she's averaging 42mi/800ft^/day and on an ebike. Her ass/saddle time deserves the credit

 

[PCeBiker]

,.. Her ass/saddle time deserves the credit

I made a wrong turn last year and did a 2 hour detour.

Almost 4½ hours on my ass, with no help from my arms and shoulders.

My range anxiety was starting to feel more like a panic attack!!

 

[PedalUma]

What's impressive is her will to do it... Though not anything I'd ever be interested in doing.
But if you look at the statistics she's averaging 42mi/800ft^/day and on an ebike. Her ass/saddle time deserves the credit

Off the chain topic: In one of the posts she claims that it is the most comfortable saddle she has ever ridden. It came with a Brooks from Pashley, I swapped it to a Boulevard 205mm from Trek/Bontrager. It got Hurricane tires and a bunch of other upgrades to the Pashley Prospero Reynolds 631 handcrafted frame with the gravel specific Cues 10-speed. She was chased by seven hounds with all her gear and got away, outsmarting the dogs and flying away. I gave her up to 864 watts, not for speed, but for climbs and for personal safety. She was in grizzly mountain country. Patrice is grinding along at just under an average of 12 mph. The new chain arrives at her sister's Friday. Once in Idaho, she had gale force winds all night, her tent blew over three times and she gave up and waited for dawn. Then she did 65 miles of loose sand with no sleep to get to a hotel to sleep after a hot bath and filling meal. She is my hero. Patrice deserves songs.

 

[Gionnirocket]

Bla bla bla... How many threads can you post the same nonsense. We get it, she's the best and you built her the best bike ever.
I think I dated a lady that had a special hand crafted toy made with Reynolds 631. . .

 

[stompandgo]

Beware of hippy appeal things.

 

[PedalUma]

Bla bla bla... How many threads can you post the same nonsense. We get it, she's the best and you built her the best bike ever.
I think I dated a lady that had a special hand crafted toy made with Reynolds 631. . . View attachment 213317

We do live in a world of hype. Some cynicism is refreshing and needed. Really it does not matter what I say. I make house calls to repair kid's bikes and adult trikes and do flats on MacFoxes. There is no glamor in that. And I appreciate a clean drivetrain. Working on a gunked up one sucks.

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Patrice McDonald | Substack

A 72-year-old cyclist crossing America on the Great American Wheel Route.

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