Guitar Ted Lube Off: Smooth Operator Lube Update

Much better when used sparingly.

The last "Lube Off" update, back in February, was all about the wet weather performance of the lubes and techniques I was testing out. (Check it out HERE) I had just tried out the new Smooth Operator lubricant on my Ti Mukluk, but it was a bit on the messy side. I offered that perhaps I used it too liberally on the Muk's chain, and that I tried it on the BMC with a restrained hand.

Well, this is after a couple of hundred miles of gravel and a few commutes. You can read the chain side plates quite clearly. Using this lube sparingly seems to be the ticket to success with it. The chain now is dry-ish, but if I roll the rollers of the chain, I get some wetness out of there still. There is s wee bit of build up inside the links and on the jockey wheels, so this isn't on the same level as DuMonde Tech, or even the Rock & Roll Gold I used last Summer, but it is close.

Conditions have been a mixed bag of wet, damp, and very dry in the weeks following the last update. The Smooth Operator lube has earned a pass on to the next phase of testing here, so I will re-up on an application to the chain on the BMC and continue onward.

So, I will move on to dry weather testing again and I am planning on adding a couple of new lubes to the mix. I finally found my sample of ChainL Lube, and I also am going to give Squirt lubricant a try in the future.

Guitar Ted Lube Off: Smooth Operator Lube Update

Much better when used sparingly.

The last "Lube Off" update, back in February, was all about the wet weather performance of the lubes and techniques I was testing out. (Check it out HERE) I had just tried out the new Smooth Operator lubricant on my Ti Mukluk, but it was a bit on the messy side. I offered that perhaps I used it too liberally on the Muk's chain, and that I tried it on the BMC with a restrained hand.

Well, this is after a couple of hundred miles of gravel and a few commutes. You can read the chain side plates quite clearly. Using this lube sparingly seems to be the ticket to success with it. The chain now is dry-ish, but if I roll the rollers of the chain, I get some wetness out of there still. There is s wee bit of build up inside the links and on the jockey wheels, so this isn't on the same level as DuMonde Tech, or even the Rock & Roll Gold I used last Summer, but it is close.

Conditions have been a mixed bag of wet, damp, and very dry in the weeks following the last update. The Smooth Operator lube has earned a pass on to the next phase of testing here, so I will re-up on an application to the chain on the BMC and continue onward.

So, I will move on to dry weather testing again and I am planning on adding a couple of new lubes to the mix. I finally found my sample of ChainL Lube, and I also am going to give Squirt lubricant a try in the future.

Guitar Ted Lube Off: Wet Season Finale

Tri-Flow on the Ti Muk

Okay, I was going to post an update on the Lube Off a while back, but I held off to sneak in another late addition, so I put it off until now. With the imminent end of Winter at hand, and a transitional "slop season" coming, I figured I would put an end to "Wet Season" testing for now. There were some odd entries into this portion of testing, so let's go back and review what I had on chains here during Wet Season.

• Tri Flow
• DuMonde Tech
• WD-40
• Grease over Tri-Flow
• Smooth Operator Lube

Okay, so with wet season I don't ever really expect a lube that is effective to be "clean". If the chain is dry, it usually ends up getting corroded and squeaky real fast. If it is clean, it is weird, and generally, not a good thing. Snow, slush, rain, and cold do weird things to chains, not to mention the chemical deicers they use on roads these days.  Conversely I don't like to see a wet, grimy chain flinging crap all over the bike either. That's generally a lube that's not only causing you more clean up time, but one that is attracting stuff you'd rather not have on your chain. No- something in between is best, in my opinion.

WD-40 was.......meh!

 

WD-40: The funny thing about this was that it actually works, up until a point. I found that I had to re-apply almost daily to keep the chain wet/lubricated. I also found that my chain was almost never dirty or a mess. I'm not 100% comfortable with how it lubricates chains, if in fact it is at all. Especially since it seems to get dry almost every ride and I don't know exactly at what point that is happening. So, I decided it wasn't cutting the mustard. End result- Not a good lubricant for wet season. 

Older pic of the Tri-Flow with grease over it.

Tri-Flow & Tri-Flow with Grease:

Okay, first off, please reference the top image for plain Tri-Flow and the one to the left here for Tri-Flow with an application of grease over the top.

Tri-Flow- whether layered over with grease or not- seemed to react about as equally well in wet snow or in rain. It was dirtier than your dry weather lubes, but it wasn't throwing crap all over, (if applied correctly), and kept the chain wet and lubricated better than most. I saw times where it was gathering sand, for instance, and crunchy noises would sometimes result. I had to periodically clean the chain, because if I did not, the Tri-Flow would go dry and then create a gunky, sticky mess on side plates and on cogs and chain rings. I will note that the grease over Tri-Flow seemed to be a tad bit better in this regard, but I quit riding that bike when conditions started calling out for full on fat bikes, so I cannot give a 100% recommendation on that. There was something to it, as far as a technique for wet weather goes, so I may return to this at some point.

In the end, I give Tri-Flow a "Good" recommendation for wet weather. It has to be maintained at regular intervals or after a particularly wet, snowy ride, but it does clean up well and a reapplication is easy.

Smooth Operator Lube: A messy lube, but it is working.

Smooth Operator Lube: 

Going to this lube's website, you don't get a lot of clues as to "why" this lube works. No technical mumbo-jumbo, no "gee-whiz" marketing spiel, just that it works for wet or dry conditions. So......there ya go. Your guess is as good as mine as to why this should be better than anything else. Oh well......

When I applied it, it looked vaguely familiar, as it was sort of thick, almost "gooey" as it came out of the applicator, (which is fantastic, by the way). I recalled Finish Line "Wet" formula, or maybe like Phil Wood lube, or like most soybean based lubricants I've tried. Anyway, if you've used those, you know what I mean about the Smooth Operator's consistency. It spread really well, and coated everything easily. Everything near it as well!

That's the main complaint so far on this lube- it's messy. Check out the image above of my Blackborow DS's chain. You can see my chain stay on the left there is coated in Smooth Operator lube. Hmm........ maybe I don't need to use as much, eh? 

I have put it on my BMC's chain.....very sparingly, I might add, and we will see how that goes in my next update.

DuMonde Tech.....yeah, that's crazy. Still champ.

 DuMonde Tech:

Okay, so if you've been following this along over the past almost year or so, you know I am a big fan of DuMonde Tech. It has just outdone everything else I've tried, wet or dry. However; that's just me. What about someone else? Okay, so I gave this stuff to my co-worker Andy to put on his Pugs SS. He rides it all the time in Winter. We took a look after about a month and a half of use and the image you see here is what it looked like.

Clean.

That's hard to beat, and with their claims of "plating the chain", I have to say that after seeing no corrosive effects or dirt sticking on it, I would have to say there is definitely something good going on with DuMonde Tech.

So, after a Wet Season of usage with all of these lubricants, DuMonde Tech is still getting my vote as the best out there. We haven't seen the full Smooth Operator Lube test done yet, so I'll hold off saying anything on that as far as a final word just now. We will continue to put others through their paces, so stay tuned as we get into warmer weather and Spring time conditions. 

Guitar Ted Lube Off: Wet Season Finale

Tri-Flow on the Ti Muk

Okay, I was going to post an update on the Lube Off a while back, but I held off to sneak in another late addition, so I put it off until now. With the imminent end of Winter at hand, and a transitional "slop season" coming, I figured I would put an end to "Wet Season" testing for now. There were some odd entries into this portion of testing, so let's go back and review what I had on chains here during Wet Season.

• Tri Flow
• DuMonde Tech
• WD-40
• Grease over Tri-Flow
• Smooth Operator Lube

Okay, so with wet season I don't ever really expect a lube that is effective to be "clean". If the chain is dry, it usually ends up getting corroded and squeaky real fast. If it is clean, it is weird, and generally, not a good thing. Snow, slush, rain, and cold do weird things to chains, not to mention the chemical deicers they use on roads these days.  Conversely I don't like to see a wet, grimy chain flinging crap all over the bike either. That's generally a lube that's not only causing you more clean up time, but one that is attracting stuff you'd rather not have on your chain. No- something in between is best, in my opinion.

WD-40 was.......meh!

 

WD-40: The funny thing about this was that it actually works, up until a point. I found that I had to re-apply almost daily to keep the chain wet/lubricated. I also found that my chain was almost never dirty or a mess. I'm not 100% comfortable with how it lubricates chains, if in fact it is at all. Especially since it seems to get dry almost every ride and I don't know exactly at what point that is happening. So, I decided it wasn't cutting the mustard. End result- Not a good lubricant for wet season. 

Older pic of the Tri-Flow with grease over it.

Tri-Flow & Tri-Flow with Grease:

Okay, first off, please reference the top image for plain Tri-Flow and the one to the left here for Tri-Flow with an application of grease over the top.

Tri-Flow- whether layered over with grease or not- seemed to react about as equally well in wet snow or in rain. It was dirtier than your dry weather lubes, but it wasn't throwing crap all over, (if applied correctly), and kept the chain wet and lubricated better than most. I saw times where it was gathering sand, for instance, and crunchy noises would sometimes result. I had to periodically clean the chain, because if I did not, the Tri-Flow would go dry and then create a gunky, sticky mess on side plates and on cogs and chain rings. I will note that the grease over Tri-Flow seemed to be a tad bit better in this regard, but I quit riding that bike when conditions started calling out for full on fat bikes, so I cannot give a 100% recommendation on that. There was something to it, as far as a technique for wet weather goes, so I may return to this at some point.

In the end, I give Tri-Flow a "Good" recommendation for wet weather. It has to be maintained at regular intervals or after a particularly wet, snowy ride, but it does clean up well and a reapplication is easy.

Smooth Operator Lube: A messy lube, but it is working.

Smooth Operator Lube: 

Going to this lube's website, you don't get a lot of clues as to "why" this lube works. No technical mumbo-jumbo, no "gee-whiz" marketing spiel, just that it works for wet or dry conditions. So......there ya go. Your guess is as good as mine as to why this should be better than anything else. Oh well......

When I applied it, it looked vaguely familiar, as it was sort of thick, almost "gooey" as it came out of the applicator, (which is fantastic, by the way). I recalled Finish Line "Wet" formula, or maybe like Phil Wood lube, or like most soybean based lubricants I've tried. Anyway, if you've used those, you know what I mean about the Smooth Operator's consistency. It spread really well, and coated everything easily. Everything near it as well!

That's the main complaint so far on this lube- it's messy. Check out the image above of my Blackborow DS's chain. You can see my chain stay on the left there is coated in Smooth Operator lube. Hmm........ maybe I don't need to use as much, eh? 

I have put it on my BMC's chain.....very sparingly, I might add, and we will see how that goes in my next update.

DuMonde Tech.....yeah, that's crazy. Still champ.

 DuMonde Tech:

Okay, so if you've been following this along over the past almost year or so, you know I am a big fan of DuMonde Tech. It has just outdone everything else I've tried, wet or dry. However; that's just me. What about someone else? Okay, so I gave this stuff to my co-worker Andy to put on his Pugs SS. He rides it all the time in Winter. We took a look after about a month and a half of use and the image you see here is what it looked like.

Clean.

That's hard to beat, and with their claims of "plating the chain", I have to say that after seeing no corrosive effects or dirt sticking on it, I would have to say there is definitely something good going on with DuMonde Tech.

So, after a Wet Season of usage with all of these lubricants, DuMonde Tech is still getting my vote as the best out there. We haven't seen the full Smooth Operator Lube test done yet, so I'll hold off saying anything on that as far as a final word just now. We will continue to put others through their paces, so stay tuned as we get into warmer weather and Spring time conditions. 

Friday News And Views

There are no more Buzzards.....at least for now.

Singular Cycles: A New Era

Let's see now, I think I first heard about Singular Cycles back when a few of the bikes showed up on mtbr.com back in '07, maybe it was? I cannot remember anymore for sure. I do recall that my interest was piqued by a planned drop bar specific, single speed-able 29"er dubbed the Gryphon. I was patiently waiting on information as the prototypes were tested, and then something pivotal happened. A friend of mine, Marty Larson, began impoting the frames. Well, I got my hands on a Gryphon and ended up loving it. Then I found a Buzzard on my doorstep. No.......not the fowl, but a steel hard tail. I also really enjoy that bike as well. Then there were Peregrines, Kites, Puffins......and all of them are cool. Everyone of them were designed, guided through manufacturing, distributed, and marketed by Sam Alison, who for all intents and purposes is Singular Cycles. Like many creatives, Mr. Alison isn't necessarily keen on doing all the tedious business stuff, so he has enlisted help.

Frank Dressler in Weselberg, Germany, a long time Singular dealer, has partnered up with Mr. Alison to be a warehousing, logistics, and administration arm for Singular Cycles.  Singular will for now, and for the immediate future, downsize its model line offerings and will possibly re-introduce models or introduce completely new models in the future.

I look forward to seeing what happens to this brand in the future. I have a feeling some interesting models may be coming at some point in the future.

New lube for the Lube-Off

Not Sade'

Yesterday I received an unexpected package which contained bicycle chain lube. Okay, it wasn't totally a surprise. I had gotten wind of this stuff via the RidingGravel.com gig. I knew that this company was looking to sponsor our Riding Gravel Radio Ranch podcast, (which, by the way, just recorded another new show with the guys from The OGRE), and that they were interested in us testing the stuff. Well, lo and behold, here it is!

This is also kind of an ironic in the sense of the timing of its arrival here as I was about to publish my latest findings for the Winter session of the Lube Off here. Well, now that this stuff has hit the doorstep, I believe I'll hold off for just a bit longer so that I can include this product in on that update.

The next update should be in about two weeks then, and I will include Tri-Flow, DuMonde Tech, my experimentation with straight up WD-40, and this Smooth Operator stuff. This Winter has been extremely cooperative, in the sense that we've had everything- rain, snow, grit, slush, dirt, and whatever else is on the streets now. There will be a few surprises, and of course, this new "unknown" lube. Their site says it is good for wet or dry applications, so what we have now for conditions should put it to a good test.

The Winter Session of the Lube Off will be coming to a close soon, so I will have to get in as much on the Smooth Operator stuff as I can in the meantime. I may introduce one more contender that claims dual-duty as well. So, stay tuned for that.....

Tragedy:

As I sat down to write this up Thursday evening, the news broke that BMX and X Games legend, Dave Mirra, had died in an apparent suicide. I'm definietely not a BMX guy by a long shot, but I have heard of Dave Mirra, of course. He was a much bigger figure in the world of cycling than being just a BMX guy. To wit: My co-worker Andy texted me about it, and that was the first I had heard about this. Neither one of us are BMX guys, and I am old enough to be Andy's father, so that should tell you how far and wide Dave Mirra's influence was felt.

That's all for this week. Don't pass the chance to reach out to someone this weekend. You never know........

Friday News And Views

There are no more Buzzards.....at least for now.

Singular Cycles: A New Era

Let's see now, I think I first heard about Singular Cycles back when a few of the bikes showed up on mtbr.com back in '07, maybe it was? I cannot remember anymore for sure. I do recall that my interest was piqued by a planned drop bar specific, single speed-able 29"er dubbed the Gryphon. I was patiently waiting on information as the prototypes were tested, and then something pivotal happened. A friend of mine, Marty Larson, began impoting the frames. Well, I got my hands on a Gryphon and ended up loving it. Then I found a Buzzard on my doorstep. No.......not the fowl, but a steel hard tail. I also really enjoy that bike as well. Then there were Peregrines, Kites, Puffins......and all of them are cool. Everyone of them were designed, guided through manufacturing, distributed, and marketed by Sam Alison, who for all intents and purposes is Singular Cycles. Like many creatives, Mr. Alison isn't necessarily keen on doing all the tedious business stuff, so he has enlisted help.

Frank Dressler in Weselberg, Germany, a long time Singular dealer, has partnered up with Mr. Alison to be a warehousing, logistics, and administration arm for Singular Cycles.  Singular will for now, and for the immediate future, downsize its model line offerings and will possibly re-introduce models or introduce completely new models in the future.

I look forward to seeing what happens to this brand in the future. I have a feeling some interesting models may be coming at some point in the future.

New lube for the Lube-Off

Not Sade'

Yesterday I received an unexpected package which contained bicycle chain lube. Okay, it wasn't totally a surprise. I had gotten wind of this stuff via the RidingGravel.com gig. I knew that this company was looking to sponsor our Riding Gravel Radio Ranch podcast, (which, by the way, just recorded another new show with the guys from The OGRE), and that they were interested in us testing the stuff. Well, lo and behold, here it is!

This is also kind of an ironic in the sense of the timing of its arrival here as I was about to publish my latest findings for the Winter session of the Lube Off here. Well, now that this stuff has hit the doorstep, I believe I'll hold off for just a bit longer so that I can include this product in on that update.

The next update should be in about two weeks then, and I will include Tri-Flow, DuMonde Tech, my experimentation with straight up WD-40, and this Smooth Operator stuff. This Winter has been extremely cooperative, in the sense that we've had everything- rain, snow, grit, slush, dirt, and whatever else is on the streets now. There will be a few surprises, and of course, this new "unknown" lube. Their site says it is good for wet or dry applications, so what we have now for conditions should put it to a good test.

The Winter Session of the Lube Off will be coming to a close soon, so I will have to get in as much on the Smooth Operator stuff as I can in the meantime. I may introduce one more contender that claims dual-duty as well. So, stay tuned for that.....

Tragedy:

As I sat down to write this up Thursday evening, the news broke that BMX and X Games legend, Dave Mirra, had died in an apparent suicide. I'm definietely not a BMX guy by a long shot, but I have heard of Dave Mirra, of course. He was a much bigger figure in the world of cycling than being just a BMX guy. To wit: My co-worker Andy texted me about it, and that was the first I had heard about this. Neither one of us are BMX guys, and I am old enough to be Andy's father, so that should tell you how far and wide Dave Mirra's influence was felt.

That's all for this week. Don't pass the chance to reach out to someone this weekend. You never know........