Ugh, yeah, me too. I suppose "I don't have any rags" is a really bad excuse for not having oiled the chain since it was last serviced. Especially because $housemate left me a bunch of old tshirts as rags when she moved out the other week.

I just hope I haven't knackered the front gears by riding with a stretched chain :-(

(posted from an Android tablet, btw)

I have yet to learn how to do all that—mind you, with the number of bikes accumulating around here, I should get plenty of practice once I do…

How often is one supposed to oil a bike chain? I just got a new bike, last weekend, and the manual said to oil the chain weekly!

Depends how often you ride and in what conditions, I'd imagine. I don't oil my chain anything like weekly :-) On the other hand, it's a pretty quick operation.

fe2h2o: the way I was taught was to apply a single drop of oil to the inside of each link (ie, the side facing the gears). Turn the pedals to advance the chain past your oilcan until you've done the whole thing. Then wipe off any excess with a rag - not that there'll be much excess if you do it that way.

Everything you could possibly want to know about chain maintenance is here - Joseph, you might be interested in the section on "Factory Lube". Following his advice on measuring chain wear, I see that I have indeed left things too long and damaged the gears :-(

It would be really nice if you could see the existing comments when writing a new one.

Showed it to a mate who volunteers at my local bike co-op; he reckons the rear gears need changed, but the front gears are probably OK. Which is good, because IIRC changing the rear gears is much easier. \o/

Testing.

And another test:-)

Another test:-)

Pozorvlak: thanks for the tips and the link!

"i don't have any rags" is such an odd and hilarious problem

i found myself in the same situation when i started exploring crafting in stained glass. i had to make a conscious choice of which bits of linens would be sacrificed for art ~grin~