Originally Posted by An old Guy .
My chain seldom makes noise. Even after a 1000 miles or more of non-maintenance. In the movie Days of Thunder there is a nice sequence about tire maintenance. The crew chief shows the driver that being smoother not only makes the tires last a lot longer but also produces faster lap times. The same lesson can be used to demonstrate that it is not lubrication that prolongs chain/cassette life. It is smoothness of the rider. A side effect of smoothness is faster rides.
Actually, no. Curious that you use a crappy movie as proof and not actual science. There is this thing called "friction". It is the friction between the metal bits in a chain as well as between contaminants and the metal bits in the chain that generates friction and degrades the metal contact surfaces, wearing away the metal. The "lubricant" ("oil" in bad movie parlance) provides a film on each surface which reduces the friction between the surfaces. It's a simple idea, really. If have a hard time wrapping your head around this idea and/or are upset that such an idea wouldn't have been represented in such a paragon of ignorance and ego as "Days of Thunder", you can use a "search engine" (it's a web application, in this case, that will search the web for pages that include or seem to be about a word or phrase you enter into the "search box" of the "search engine". In this case, the word you should type in that box (you can get to that box by moving your screen cursor to the box and left clicking with your "mouse") is "tribology." Typing in "lubricant" will also. Press "enter" or "return" on your keyboard, and the search engine will go to work and eventually return with a list of sites that match one or more of the search parameters. Popular "search engines" are Google, Bing, Dogpile, Yahoo, and many others.
Even more stupid is comparing tire wear to chain wear. Such a comparison shows a complete lack of knowledge of both. Please don't lubricate your tires, no matter what a character in a movie tells you. Oddly enough, especially since they didn't mention this in your movie, the goal with a race tire is to provide a high level of friction between the tire and track surface, balanced with acceptable tire wear. The goal with a chain is to minimize friction between metal parts. If you'd like, I can draw you a picture.
I once saw the movie "The Final Countdown." I guess since it was shown in the movie and following your "Days of Chunder" movie theory, aircraft carriers really are time travel machines, and time travel is real.
It's too bad that your Special Edition copy of "Days of Thunder" wasn't stolen.