One step hot wax application to factory new chains. What a time saver, and I am very happy with the results.
I was going thru chains and cassettes with an unsatisfactory level of frequncy. I also hated all the time I was spending on wiping, applying, and often getting rags full of dirty grime. With the wax system...my chain purrs...and I can wipe my chain with fingers and they come off clean! Before ordering, I actually went to the ZeroFrictionCycling website...where I was shocked to find the lubricant I was using was proba ly the worst choice of anything they tested. It is no wonder I was burning thru hardware. Silca products are amongst the best...and I am very enthusiastic about switchi g to a cleaner running driveline and being able to get a huge increase in driveline lifespan. A good investment in longer term savings.
To preface, I've started measuring my wax intervals by ride time instead of distance since I ride mixed surfaces, and dirt is slower. Aside from mud and wet, I've been finding that road vs dirt ride time between rewaxing tends to be close, while distance is not.
That said, the EnduranceChip definitely works, and I am getting at least 50% more ride time before I start to hear the little chirps my chain makes when it's about time to rewax. I'll consider adding more endurance additive for some upcoming long bikepacking trips! The only downside I see is that I may want multiple pots for multiple wax blends. Or I'll just have to go all-in on the endurance blend, since the efficiency loss is not an issue for me in my riding.
As part of getting a killer deal on a new bike, I decided to spend some of my savings on the Silca chain waxing system and convert several bikes to wax. Yes, even with the Silca system on sale you can probably cobble together a Rube Goldberg solution out of a cheap slow cooker and other bits and pieces. But why try so hard to save $20 or $30? If you're looking at wax as an alternative to conventional lubes, you're probably already spending many multiples of the potential savings on other bike stuff. Don't cheap-out now. The Silca Chain Waxing System is complete and highly functional, and the wax pot comes with a digital control/thermostat so you can truly control the temperature of your wax. A cheap slow cooker isn't going to have that.
I'm delighted to no longer be dealing with dirty drivetrains. I pack and travel with a bike a few times a year and it will be a lot easier when I no longer need to clean/cover the drivetrain each time. Performance is good -- the newly waxed chains are quiet and work well after a brief ride to loosen them up.
My only regret is using the strip clip. No question about it, the strip clip does indeed work great on a factory-greased chain. But if you're converting an existing bike, you'll want to do a deep clean of the entire drivetrain and IMHO the easiest part of a drivetrain deep clean is stripping/scrubbing the chain. And this could just be the type of conventional lube I had been using, but the strip clip didn't work at all for an existing chain that I converted. I needed to start over and conventionally strip/scrub the chain because when I skipped that step it ended up being a gloppy mess.
A decision to use this product comes down to how you feel about degreasing chains. I've never considered it to be all that difficult, and so I'm neutral on this product.
I bought StripClip when I converted to wax on all my road bikes a few months ago. I put 3 new factory-greased chains through the process and StripChip seemed to work well. Wax adherence was good, and the chains have a fairly consistent look to them. I used the recommended 1 StripClip per 2 chains. After degreasing the factory chains, I waxed a dirty used chain and StripClip didn't work at all. Maybe it works better on other lubes, but the Muc-Off C3 Ceramic Dry Lube that I had been using seemed to be totally unaffected. I then stripped that chain with solvent/scrubbing and the waxing process worked fine after that.
One more consideration. StripClip increases the melting point of the wax, so subsequent waxing needs to be done at a higher temperature than is required for straight wax. Since higher temperatures degrade wax faster, through trial and error I adjust the temperature to the lowest that will melt the wax. I suppose at some point the StripClip is diluted to the point where this isn't an issue, but maybe I should just dump my "StripClip'd" wax and start over. It's not a huge deal, but it does take some of the simplicity out of the actual waxing process. Since in the future I see myself waxing a mix of new and used chains, I won't buy this product again.
