Originally Posted by An old Guy .
1) Perhaps you could figure out what your bicycling costs per mile. It might surprise you. The cost of chains and cassettes is only a small part of the cost of my bicycling.
2) I get reasonable chain life. Using my standard of maintenance, you appear not to. I suspect it is not our difference of knowledge of tribology that accounts for it.
3) I can wear out a chain in 1000 miles if I ride in a very aggressive style. I chose to ride less aggressively and my chains last much longer. It is a very simple experiment that you could do. It should only take you 50-60 hours to wear out a chain if you ride aggressively, And another 200-300 hours to wear out a chain riding less aggressively. I expect to hear from you in a couple months after you have finished up the experiment.
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There is a lot of disagreement about maintenance because there is a wide range of abuses that bicyclists subject their bicycles to. So there are a lot of different maintenance plans.