Which Chain Lubricants Brand Wins?
We compared 7 chain lubricants options head to head. CRC came out on top. See the measured results, the runner-up, the budget pick, and a link to the full test video.
Purple Extreme
Affiliate link. We may earn a commission at no extra cost to you.
Lucas
Affiliate link. We may earn a commission at no extra cost to you.
The measured results
Every number below is read straight from the test. Scroll sideways to see all measurements. Products are listed in the order they finished.
| Product | Claims/appearance | Dirt/sand attraction test | Rust prevention (5x corrosive spray/hour) | Film strength (lubricity tester) | Oil retention after engine run | Claims | Rust prevention | Appearance | Context |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1CRC Extreme Duty Open Gear and Chain Lube | claims reduced friction/wear via Moly and graphite; visually the darkest, most clearly-coated, most oily-looking product of the group | 'just like used motor oil, has a lot of sand on it' - worst tier along with used motor oil | absolutely no rust formed, the best of all products tested, though the chain retained a lot of dirt/grime unrelated to rust | came in 1st place | did the best of all products; plenty of CRC remained on the chain through the entire engine run | not tested | not tested | not tested | not tested |
| 2Purple Extreme Extreme Synthetic Lubricant | not tested | did very well, very little sand, probably a little less than DuPont ('it's very close'), among the best 2 of the 7 products | not tested | finished 2nd place, 'doing a very good job' | 'has great film strength but unfortunately it doesn't seem to stick to the chain very well'; by the end of the engine run the chain and paper-towel wipe both looked dry | marketed as 'the world's most advanced bike chain lubricant', 400+ miles between applications, extreme water wash-off resistance | 'finished sort of middle of the pack', some corrosion formed but not as bad as some of the other products | not tested | not tested |
| 3Lucas Red 'N' Tacky / Chain Lube (Lucas Oil chain and cable lube) | not tested | 'has a lot of sand on it, probably just as much as used motor oil and definitely as much as CRC' - worst tier | not tested | grouped with DuPont and Liquid Wrench as 'all about the same' (see videoNotes on this test's ambiguous ordering) | 'did a pretty decent job of sticking to the chain, obviously not nearly as good as CRC, but there was some Lucas left on the chain by the time the test was over' | 'anti-sling penetrant', penetrates/lubricates/extends chain and sprocket life | 'did pretty good as far as corrosion prevention, I don't see that much rust' | translucent, looked wet/lubricated like Purple Extreme, Schaeffer's, and Liquid Wrench | not tested |
| 4DuPont Chain Saver (wax-based) | not tested | has sand on it but finer grit, not large pieces; among the best 2 of the 7 products alongside Purple Extreme | not tested | grouped with Liquid Wrench and Lucas as 'all about the same' (see videoNotes) | chain and paper-towel wipe looked dry, 'nothing really on this besides a little bit of dirt' - poor retention | wax-based, for chain-driven vehicles, self-cleaning technology claimed, reduces chain wear | 'definitely did better than used motor oil, however there is still rust forming on several links of this chain' | the only product that looked/felt totally dried off and dry to the touch immediately after application, unlike the wet-looking translucent products | not tested |
| 5Liquid Wrench | not tested | spoken as 'Luka drench'; 'does not have as much sand on it as used motor oil or CRC but does have more sand on it than DuPont' - mid tier | not tested | grouped with DuPont and Lucas as 'all about the same' | 'there doesn't seem to be any left on this chain... seems very dry' - poor retention | not tested | 'seemed to have the most rust up to this point' in the narration order (later superseded by Schaeffer's, which the narrator explicitly calls worse; see videoNotes) | not tested | not tested |
| 6Schaeffer's Moly Roller Chain Lube | not tested | 'probably finished in third place in this category behind purple extreme as well as DuPont' (best-tier grouping ambiguous vs Liquid Wrench/Lucas/CRC/used motor oil; see videoNotes) | not tested | finished 3rd place | slung off a lot of oil early in the test; the chain began smoking noticeably around 30 seconds into the engine run, a unique negative sign not seen with any other product; by the end of the run the chain was dry | claims to triple chain life | 'came in last in this department, clearly it has a tremendous amount of rust' - worst rust performance of all 7 products | translucent, looked wet/lubricated like Purple Extreme, Lucas, and Liquid Wrench | not tested |
| 7Used Motor Oil | not tested | 'definitely a magnet for dirt and sand... just loaded with sand' - worst tier along with CRC | not tested | 'finished middle of the pack' | 'did not stick to the chain, this chain is really dry' - poor retention | not tested | 'quite a bit of rust' formed, a poor result | not tested | baseline/control product; the previous owner of the narrator's hay baler had been using this on its chain, which motivated the whole test |
How it was tested
- dirt/sand attraction: applying each product to a new chain, running it through sand/dirt, and comparing how much sticks
- rust prevention: spraying chains with tap water then a hydrogen peroxide/vinegar/salt corrosive mix, 5 applications over 1 hour
- film strength: measuring each product on a lubricity tester
- oil retention/adhesion: running each treated chain on a chainsaw engine for about a minute (with the oiler emptied) and checking how much product remains afterward
“so CRC won the competition by having tremendous film strength and coming out on top in three or four categories”
Data notes and caveats
This video splits into a technical winner (CRC, which swept rust prevention, film strength/lubricity, and oil retention) versus practical, use-case-specific recommendations: Purple Extreme for bicycle chains specifically (CRC's dirt-magnet property explicitly disqualifies it from that exact use case, which is the video's own stated motivation), and Lucas as a lower-cost alternative when raw film strength matters less than simple adhesion. The film-strength/lubricity-tester paragraph has an internally ambiguous ordering: it states 'CRC came in first place, DuPont/Liquid Wrench/Lucas all are about the same, then Purple Extreme finished in second place... and Schaeffer's finishing in third place' - the placements (1st/2nd/3rd) and the 'about the same' grouping don't sit in a single clean sequence in the transcript, so results are reported per-brand verbatim rather than forcing a single unambiguous 1-through-7 ranking. 'Luka drench' in the sand-test section is resolved to Liquid Wrench per the description's Products Tested list and by its 'penetrating fluid' framing later in the transcript. Chapters exist for only 3 of the 7 products (Purple Extreme, DuPont, Liquid Wrench), so chapterMap is false. CRC and Used Motor Oil are absent from the amzn.to Products Tested link list but both are named explicitly in the description's prose sentence and have full, consistent test data throughout, so both are treated as real tested products.
More Shop Chemicals & Lubricants
Which Brake Parts Cleaner Brand Wins?
Gunk (Chlorinated)
See the resultsWhich Oil Spill Absorbent Brand Wins?
16 products tested
See the resultsWhich Hand Cleaners Brand Wins?
Permatex Fast Orange Extreme
See the results