Morning all
I was also intrigued by this and literally opened a can of worms trying to get to the bottom of lubes, cleaning, drive train efficiency etc - I did a ton of research to try and find which method was best - originally back when Friction Facts was independent (they’re owned by Ceramic Speed now, or at least Jason Smith now works for them) and then onto Adam Kerrin at Zero Friction in Australia - again, an independent testers. He told me things off the record that literally made my jaw drop - I work in the music industry and I hear a lot of b*llocks all the time but the things he told me were amazing…!
Anyway - I did manage to get to the point of finding out that TT riders in the U.K. have been pretty much bang on about wax all these years - further more, there’s a misapprehension that waxing chains is a faff and difficult to do - it really isn’t - it’s far easier (And cheaper) than cleaning chains (especially using one of those ‘roll through baths’) and then using drip lubes, having to re-clean, the lube picking you dust and crap off the road and essentially wearing the chain out and losing you watts in the process (chain longevity and efficiency are, after all, the same thing…)
I started looking into all this about 3 years ago and more recently made a couple of videos about it - there’s supposed to be a third part which I’ll get around to but parts 1 and 2 are here:
There are some really good comments on the videos too, more often than not I referred the Q’s about different chemical compounds back to Adam Kerrin as he’s the expert on that…! So they’re worth a read…
Anyway, long story short, I wax all the chains on all the bikes in my household because it’s simply easier, cheaper and more efficient (in every possible way) than using drip lubes. I’ve both made my own wax to Jason Smith’s original recipe and now use Molten Speed wax as it’s the same recipe. Jason now makes a wax that he says is more efficient - which is what they use on their UFO chains - but it’s unlikely to be hugely different to Molten Speed wax. Adam did tell me what he thought the added material was likely to be but I’ve forgotten now, I’m afraid…! To be honest, the losses when using a clean and waxed drive train are so low that we really are talking very small margins - especially compared to a black, sticky, dirty drive train…
Just to be 100% clear - I have no vested interest in any of these things other than exactly the same as you guys - I just become a little bit obsessed by things with a quest to find definitive and independent answers to things that often manufacturers don’t quite give us all the right data for (see the Ceramic Speed/Muc Off testing data issues) https://www.ceramicspeed.com/en/cycling/journal/an-open-communication-on-muc-offs-claims-on-testing/
Josh Poertner at Silca (in the above video someone posted) is a bona fide legend with these things (if you listen to Marginal Gains, you’ll know what I’m talking about - he worked with Cancellara on the Roubaix campaign and worked out how much Tub pressure would be lost by the time they got to the trickiest sectors so that they filled them with the right pressures at the start for later in the race - if you look at pictures of Spartacus in that race, there’s Sharpie on the tan walls - that’s Josh’s notes on pressures etc - the maths for all this is baffling…!) - anyway, I bring him up because in the Podcast he categorically states that waxing chains is the most efficient method. Jason Smith, Adam Kerrin and Josh Poertner all state that waxing chains is the most efficient method and any drip wax is second best but exist as there will always be a barrier to people wanting to use waxed chains - the best drip lubes on test are: Silca NFS and Squit. Take a look at both (successful) World Hour Records that Josh has worked on - they both used wax chains - even if the ones that they say they used possibly weren’t… 
Right, I hope that’s been of some use - I have spent 100’s of hours digging on this for the same reasons as you guys and will never go back to drip lube. It’s too simple not to.
Oh, I really should tilt you towards Adam Kerrins work at Zero Friction - but go via the Cycling Tips article as it’s pretty much everything that I’ve told you here - it’s a good read…
(oh, and turtle)
