First is absoluteBlack Graphene lube. Yes it is the most expensive bottle of lubricant ever, however its extreme longevity per application and low parts wear rate will make it very competitive vs many bottles of drip lubes on LBS shelves, but with some well proven low friction, low wear and single application longevity advantages. If you can handle the initial investment, for some riders this will be be the lubricant they have been waiting for;

• Riders who want to apply a lube every approx. 1500 to 2000km
• Going on cycling holiday, bike packing, long harsh conditions events etc

ZFC was heavily involved in testing prototype version, production version will be tested as soon as I can get through my existing booked test list and can then crunch the numbers – but the numbers will be extremely good, or I wouldn’t be stocking it! And the total cost to run drive train per 10,000km will be much lower than one expects I believe, despite the rather hefty cost for a bottle, there is a good amount of lube in the bottle and each application lasts so long and with very low parts wear rates – it will beat a lot of $15 a bottle lubes for total running costs all factors considered.

See absoluteBlack Graphene product page of ZFC website for full details. I have an extremely limited number of bottles and its going to be awhile before next re-supply, so if you are keen, don’t dally.

Second is Silca Super Secret Drip lube. Normally I would need to test before stock however;

• It is going to take awhile to get to testing and the testing will take up to a couple of months.
• I have email discussions with Josh Poertner as part of a larger discussion re manufacturer testing and claims, from these discussions (and Josh / Silca being extremely dependable re product claims and quality) I am confident enough to stock prior to putting through the full ZFC test protocol which is simply going to be months away from completion.
• Should I get any worrisome surprises from testing or from customer feedback, I can review decision to stock and recommend prior to full ZFC testing – however as above, from discussions I have much confidence in the product.

Again refer to the Silca Super Secrete Drip lube product page for full product information.

Yes at this stage I am 99.99999% confident this lubricant will be perfectly compatible and the perfect companion to those on Mspeedwax – as best as I can tell from the discussions this is likely to be the highest level wax emulsion lubricant to complement hot melt immersive waxing on the market (another reason I have been very keen to stock sooner vs later).

The first question many will have (already have been asking as was covered in previous latest news) is can this replace hot melt immersive waxing?

Not quite – Immersive waxing simply has some unassailable advantages. Firstly, much of the volume of any wax emulsion lubricant needs to be carrier, so there will always be a lesser coating of wax per treatment vs an immersive wax.

And as the chain is operating externally, over time even in dry road conditions, contamination will still build up inside the chain – abrasive airborne dust will become pressed into set wax and be effectively land locked in there. Adding next coat will temporarily improve ratio of lube to contamination, however over X thousand km’s, obviously there will be a measurably higher amount of friction and wear vs an immersive wax chain.

When you re-wax with an immersive wax (like mspeedwax) chain is being swished around in typically 400ml of wax providing a great level of flush clean. Contamination will build up in wax pot over time so periodically wax should be changed, however vs dripping on 5 to 10ml of lube onto a chain, immersive re-waxing will simple re-set and re coat the chain in a solid coating of super slippery wax.

So immersive waxing will still give you more km’s per treatment, and over thousands of km’s of riding – immersive waxing will still have chain in state very close to where you started, whereas with drip lubes some contamination build up over time is inevitable, and depending on how good is the lubricant depends on how frequent you should fully solvent flush clean and reset contamination.

But for those whom waxing was simply never going to be on their radar, then getting as close as you can in a bottle may appeal, and as mentioned before, it is going to be a perfect accompaniment for those already on msw.

If the price is a bit high for thee (it’s silca peoples… they are the Rolex brand of the cycling World .  On that, this would make ceramic speed the Patek Phillipe of the cycling world, absoluteBlack Graphene is aiming to take the Hublot Tourbillon or Urwerk position. If you are unfamiliar with Urwerk watches, google them! As soon as I have spare 750k for a watch……….) Anyway, I was saying… if the price is a bit high, then don’t forget about Tru-Tension Tungsten All weather or Race lube.

The race lube is really for race chains, but hey if have the extra cash it is supremely clean to complement waxing. However the Tungsten All weather is proving quite popular as it is also an exceptionally clean and low component wear rate lubricant for either a) complementing waxing, b) stand alone if hot melt waxing is not (yet) your bag, and it doesn’t cost too much.

More news soon, a lot (A LOT) happening in the background on many fronts as always. But in short, if I look back even just a couple of years, the number of really top level proven lubricant choices was slim pickings.  2020 has seen a lot of forward movement indeed, and it has been great to see that this critical low hanging fruit aspect of easiest and biggest watts savings and drive train wear rate savings (one of the best win wins in cycling) is increasingly getting the focus from manufacturers and cyclists alike that it deserves.

**Note immersive waxing with cheap paraffin or candles does not really count as cheap paraffin has a very high mineral oil content, it goes dirty, gunky quite quickly vs the extremely high grade paraffin used in mspeedwax / silca super secret etc. Candles also often contain soy or palm oil. Its not pretty. It will not leave you with a solid super slippery coating but a gunky gummy coating.  Sometimes you get what you pay for.  DO NOT believe at face value a lot of the rubbish you see on you-tube, there is more miss-information and voodoo out there about waxing, chain lubes, chain cleaning than pretty much any topic on cycling I can think of.