Scottoilers - worth the money?
 

Hi,

I was wandering if Scottoilers are worththe money? Do they really get good even coverage on the chain? Or are you better off to take note of your milage and oil periodically? If so, how often do you oil the chain?

Thanks,
Wes

How faithfull are you
 

I have a scott and it is the best extra I have ever put on a bike. Having said that I am not the most faithfull when it comes to recording mileage or remembering to carry oil and lube my chain.

I find with the tour pack on my oiler I go thousands of Kilometers before refilling is required. It applies ample lube and I am a happy camper.

I am sure that others are going to advise about the evils of oiling a chain in case you pick up sand or grit however for me and my style of riding I couldn't ask for more.

One note is that the bottom of my left hand case is usualy covered in oil so care needs to be taken before tossing it on the wifes clean bed spread to unpack after a trip.

Rick

The dogs mate I have had one on my bikes for the last 2 and the curent one is on 27 000 still the original chain and adjusted it once in that time. left side a bit oily but well worth it.

Yep, me too - doubles the life maybe. On a big trip a Scottoiler will pay for itself pretty quickly.

Simon

It's a you and your bike thing
 

Lots of 'for and against' points, but as ever it comes down to you and your attitude.

If you want to 'fill and forget,' then I think these devices are excellent.

If you like to check your bike over personally after every days riding, use the best products available for servicing, and more importantly, have the room to carry them all with you, then nothing beats this approach.

As mentioned oil can turn into a grinding paste in some locations, and a dryer ceramic lubrication product will be better here. But it needs applying by hand and will you remember to do it?

I've never been sure though why anyone would pay so much for a simple device that they made complicated. A small plastic drinks bottle, length of tube and an empty bic pen worked just as well on my Yammy XJ550, but then, I never took her across the beach!!!!

For the cheapskates amongst us (that includes me;o) try these LOOBMAN - manual chain lubrication system for all motorcycles with regular, O-Ring and X-Ring chains I have had one fitted to my Triumph for approx 4.5 years, my first chain lasted 30,000 miles, which for a 1200cc rode in all weathers isn't bad, also it is very easy and simple to set up and repair/modify if needed:thumbup1: Just give it a squeeze when you feel like it/remember, no such thing as too much oil on a chain.
After a while I modified mine with a small piece of copper brake pipe to drip the oil on the chain, the plastic zip ties did wear out, the copper pipe is more robust :mchappy:

Trophymick

I made my own chainoiler a few years ago (before I'd even heard of Loobman et al) and it has significantly extended the life of the chain on my CCM (600 single). Previously no matter how much spray lube I put on it all seemed to have vanished by the next stop - particularly on wet days

The only problem is that the chain on the CCM is on the opposite side to the stand (ie the chain is on the right, the stand on the left as you sit on it) so that when you park drips from the oiler fall on the tyre. Most other bikes seem to have the chain on the same side as the stand and the drips fall on the ground.

As it's DIY I'll eventually redesign it but even commercial ones would have the same problem.

Should've kept it on
 

I bought a used Triumph Trophy a few years ago with a Scott Oiler with tourpack already fitted (basically just a bigger reservoir) which was great but it kept getting air locks which stopped it working, The clever thing to do would have been either spend the time to make it work, or remove the big reservoir and just use the standard one, remembering to fill it regularly. Instead I threw a hissy fit and gave up completely and returned to spray on lubes. I'm convinced chain life suffered as a result

mine kept getting airlocks, but the nozzle on the end had a leak. once that was sorted its been working fine, my chain still looks new after a year, no rust at all, and when its adjusted properly there is very little gunk on the wheel, another thing most "antis" like to tell you. a lot less gunk than normal chain lubes, in fact.
and i didnt bother with the dual sided adaptor, my chain oiler only has the one nozzle and the whole chain gets oiled, including the inside plates that dont usually get sprayed with a can.

the only thing about it for long distance work is the regular size resevoir has only enough oil for about 400mi, so youve always got to carry a bottle of oil. go for the bigger ones if you can fit them. i couldnt fit the touring resevoir to my sprint but they do a "tube" resevoir now.

Aside from relieving the chore of lubricating the chain I think it pays for itself over the long run.
I think the kit with the large touring reservoir is about the same cost as a chain and sprocket set. With a Scott oilier I get more than twice the life out of a chain so the pay back is about 25,000 miles for me.
I think the oil sold by Scott oil is expensive, so I tend to use gear oil. The touring reservoir lasts around 4,500 miles between fill ups.

I did have a problem on a KTM that a lot of oil drops ended up on the rear tyre, never quite solved that problem, I think it was something to do with the air flow around the rear wheel, but that happened if I used sprayed oil aswell.
Steve

To oil or not to oil?
 

I'm new to the world of motorcycling and am getting confused about when and when not to oil the chain. I have an O-ring chain on my DR650 and will be putting an X-ring on before my trip. I've been told to simply clean the chain with a nylon brush and a mild soap, and not to oil it. In other places I hear to install a scott-oiler and oil the chain continuously. Is this one of those debates where some people do it one way and others do it another way, both feeling that they are right? Or is there a general agreement on when to and when not to oil the chain?
Jeff

I use a Scottoiler. Requires a bit of maintenance from time to time (clearing blocked discharge pipe, prime out air locks etc.) but generally does a good job. Saves worrying about the chain, especially on long trips. It does spray a bit of oil over the wheel and rear guard (I have rigged up a plastic chain guard to catch most of it). Back-up service is excellent.

Loobman!
 

Jeff, read the loobman website. Their explanation is the best I have seen. I have two Loobmans (Loobmen??) fitted and they are great, and about 1/4 the price of a Scottoiler. The only downside is if you are the sort of person who forgets to use it, then it doesn't take care of itself, like the Scott. They say that you can use any kind of oil, which is handy, but I tend to use chainsaw bar oil as it is pretty clingy and much cheaper than motorcycle chain oil.

Regards

Nigel in NZ

scotties are great......
 

Until they break. I gave mine a hammering, ity worked really well on european roads but I had problems in the desert. To get the sand off the chain I refilled with ATF (low cling, higher viscosity, higher flow rate). This seemed to work OK but required regular cleaning of front sprocket etc. Chucking the bike down in the sand ripped the dual feed thingy in half, bodged repair and it kept on working.... then the scottoiler itself melted! To be fair this did happen when my rear cylinder stopped firing, dumped a load of fuel in my exhaust and turned the bike into a flame thrower

Unfortunatly I never tried any alternatives. My chain did for nearly 20,000km but was utterly buggered by the end (needed tightening every hour of the last two days). I think that on balance Scottoilers are great for bikes. Sand is not.

Chain oilers are one of the most important developments for bikes in decades. I like the Scottoiler and am currently on a 30,000 miles chain and sprockets, as others report too. I use EP 80 gear oil.

I fancy the Loobman for my city bike however as it only does short trips.

"I think the oil sold by Scott oil is expensive, so I tend to use gear oil."

It is pricey, although not extraordinarily so.

I believe that chain saw oil makes the best cheap replacement. It is very similar to scott oiler oil, both in weight and its anti-fling capacities. But whatever works for you...

Simon

I like the idea but as someone else posted, oiling your chain after a days ride gives you the excuse to check over the bike.

Iv had a scottoiler and I could never get the drip right. Either making a mess or not oiling enough.

They do drasitcally improve your chain life if your lazy on maintenance but not really neccessary.

Riding through dust and sand, an oily chain will ruin the chain.

What's the viscosity of Scott oil?
 

I'm using the heavy oil at the moment (for hot places) and it's too thick (cos I'm currently in a cold place). I don't want to go through the hassle and expense of buying the real thing so I thought I'd go the chain oil option. Any idea of the right chainsaw oil I should use? or will it all do?

cheers
Brett

Fit and forget....
 

Although I think they make sense for use in your home environment, I would never use one on a trip. You get lulled in to a false sense of security and don't check the chain and sprockets. If I hadn't been lubing the chains every day I wouldn't have noticed the fact that my wifes new O-ring chain had stretched so much in one day that it had started to erode the engine casing, in the middle of Patagonia!!

I have a dual injector Scotty on my KLR650, and i think it's great. The dual injector was a bit tricky to install (and I lost one nozzle to a sprocket bolt when reversing, on my first attempt at installation). I find that I watch the oiler and chain on a daily basis anyway, but the difference is that now, I just need to have a peek, and normally no other action is required (as oppopsed to actually having to oil on a daily basis). Every few days, I needed to top up the reservoir, which is a trivial task. If you need to re-prime the system (only required first time around, or if the reservoir runs dry) don't forget to reset the valve from "prime" afterwards though, or else the oiler will promptly dump the entire reservoir's contents all over the chain, rear wheel, and possibly the brake discs and pads! I did this (hey, I'm not perfect!), and it caused a big dirty mess that caused people to approach me to ask me if I knew that the bike had a serious oil leak!

I can understand why people doing dirt / sand routes don't use oilers.. that stands to reason.. sand + oil = nice abrasive paste.

For an O ring / X ring, oiling *is* recommended to keep the rubber o-rings soft. If the seals harden, the internal lubrication is lost, and chain life suffers. If the o-rings harden, it also causes a lot of resistance, which eats your mpg (kmpl) and your power.

In Canada you can buy winter or summer grade chainsaw chain oil .
I generally use winter grade because it flows easily .
You could mix in some parrafin or diesel to thin yours out a bit and make it flow better .


Of the spray on chain lube ,I have found PJ1 to be much better than the others.

Hello Wesley
 

The answer is.........YES, DEFINITELY. I wouldn't have a bike without one. End of story. There is no debate to be had on this issue.

Chris

No Debate?
 

Hmmm, well I would say, by the fact that this thread is well on it's way into the second page, that there IS debate to be had on this issue. I actually would say that no, they are not worth the money, TO ME. My Loobman does a great job, some say better, some say not as good as the Scott, but at 1/4 the price.

Regards

Nigel in NZ

Another vote for the 'Loobman' :thumbup1: I got 30,000 miles from my 1200 Trophy chain and sprockets, using a Loobman, cost effective:mchappy:
Scotoilers are a good bit of kit, but way too expensive for what they are, a few pieces of rubber/plastic tubing and a plastic reservoir :confused1:
Plus more to go wrong with all that plumbing, I have heard they are a PITA to bleed? But they are better than having nothing fitted, and relying on anal retentiveness :rofl:

Trophymick

Scottoilers? Chains? What are those then? :confused1:







(I'm surprised that no other BMW owners have posted something like that :innocent: )

They are the things that make the back wheel go round and round :rofl:
Instead of these oh nooooo its broken - ::. UKGS'er.com .::
and considerably less expensive in the event of a (re-occurring) seal/bearing failure:thumbup1: The Japanese shaft drives didn't/don't seem to have many problems :mchappy:
Meeeeooowwww!:ban:


Trophymick

Maybe it's the lack of a Scottoiler that's causing them to break :rolleyes2:


I don't want to bring up the age old argument of chain vs. shaft, but I personally hate having to think about oiling a chain at the end of a long days ride through water and mud. If I had a chain driven bike, I would definitely fit a Scottoiler or something similar (My old BSA B40 had a primary drive with built-in total loss chain oiler - no, it didn't just leak oil, it was designed by the factory to do the job), although for sand, I know that this is not recommended.

Well I have two of the things, the one on my '91 Tenere works perfectly, I couldn't recommend it more highly; the one on my AT is a worst nightmare. It won't work, or works erratically and intermittently. So as I can't trust the thing I end up crawling around the ground, which is what its supposed to avoid, to see if its working and manually oiling the chain anyway...just in case.

Don't ask me!!!!! :confused1:


I must say though that they are a bit Heath Robinson like!!and expensive as well.

Best excuse ever for a BM or a Deauville - only joking they are not as bad as that!!!:nono:

Hi,

We used a Scottoiler on the Vstrom for our UK to Aust trip, the first chain lubing system I have ever used on any bike I have owned, it worked a treat, highly recommended. I have never seen a loobman and didn't know they existed when I bought the Scottoiler, but if I had known probably would have given one a go and been happy - you gotta be happy with 1/4 the price.

I am sort of person that checks the bike over (quick walk around) at start of the day and at every fuel stop to check for any problems - ie anything loose, missing, broken, leaking etc. At this time I always look at the chain to see if its tentioned and properly lubed and at scottoiler to see if it needs toping up. The scottoiler is mounted where its easy to see at a glance and also easy to adjust/refill. If chain looks too dry, I simply give the flow rate a tweak up, and if quite oily and a little too much fling-off, tweak it down. Then at next stop check it again to see if its OK now. After initial set-up I have never used drops/minute, just tweak flow up or down depending on what I think it needs.

Its much harder to get the correct oils when travelling 3rd world countries, so I just used left over engine oil in scottoiler, probably not as good as scottoil/bar-oil/ gear-oil but it worked fine and no need to try to buy & carry a range of oils. Its hard enough 2-up with all your gear, no need to make it harder. I put new chain & sprockets on in Greece and we got home to Aus with same, now with over 35,000km on them. Front sprocket was quite worn but rear sprocket and chain still OK, so a few days ago I replaced the front 16t I have been running with the 17t spare I had carried all the way - gotta get some use out of it. I will be surprised if I don't get 50,000km before full replacement.

I find the oiler fling-off easier to clean up than the residue from spray-oil which usually needs lots of solvent as it seems to go solid when mixed with road muck. I often turn up the flow on the oiler when on dirt or particularly after dirt so it cleans the chain, a bit of extra fling-off, but cleans chain with no effort.

I am a convert to oilers....

Skillo

Read my review and see if a Scottoiler is for you,

F650 Ride the World - A journey of Global Proportions

Much better and much cheaper.

In my opinoin of course.

LOOBMAN - manual chain lubrication system for all motorcycles with regular, O-Ring and X-Ring chains

I have one on my XT. It only oils when I want it to, doesnt make a mess, can run on any oil , easy to fit and only costs £20.

Happy days !

I have a view on both. At the moment my Dads varadero1000 has a scottoiler on it and to be frank it is good. For the money you do have to do a bit of fiddling but once fiddled it works great but you have to keep an eye on the level of oil (ran out on ireland trip) and keep an eye on the chain as it wears but not as fast.

The loobman i bought and placed on my big brothers varadero 125. I have only used it a few times since placed on but it does work but takes time to fit and you have to have the bottle in easy excess for when you want old which can be a bugger. (scottoiler under seat or on number plate). The few problems i have had are remebering to use it on a trip, getting the oil to run the full length of tube, getting it to go out the plastic ends onto the chain.

All the problems of both oilers can be fixed it just takes time. On money wise the loobman wins hands down at £18 (ebay) it is cheap but at £70 + attachment (if you pay for it) is more expensive but you get more for your money and better control over the oiler.

For me it would have to be the scottoiler as you just start the bike and it goes you stop it stops. easy. but not as cheap!!!

I had a Scottoiler for years, and also another device (CLS200u or something like that?) that had wires going to the battery, where it got a hunch that now the bike´s running its time to get to work.

Both require some time to fit into the bike, and some time to maintain them as well. And after a few months, sometimes even half a year or so, both broke down for whatever reason (there were several), but anyway the oiler was the most common place where I had to fix something on any bike. They just do not last, and I got fed up with both. They do work well when they do, though.

Now I got a Loobman, and it was easier to fit, requires you to remember to use it (ive got no problem with that as Im used to checking the condition on the chain) but on the other hand there isnt much that can go broke. The steelwire thats used to keep the oilpipe in the right position isnt very convincing, though..
Only had it for a few weeks now, but so far I dont feel like tearing it off the bike (like I sometimes did with the more tricky solutions!).. planning to put some chainsaw oil into the bottle instead of motor oil to maybe get less oil flying around the back of the bike. For me this system seems to be LOW-TECH enough, while others sadly werent.

yeah ... full stop

You can sometimes pick up used Scotties/Loobmans on the cheap on sites like www. ebay.com. I paid about 15 quid for my Scottoiler, if I remember correctly. I then went on to get the high capacity reservoir on the cheap, but never really needed to install it.

Well, this thread has convinced me of the virtues of the Scottoiler! Just bought the Touring kit today, will try to have it fitted this weekend or next week.

:scooter:

Good lad you wont regret it, a few points keep the re near the engine where its always WARM (Helps flow when its cold)

Make it so that from the Res it has to run uphill for a few inches, this gives a SMALL airlock when the bikes not moving, that way when you start up in the mornings it doesn't drip out right away mine starts to work at about 1/4 of a mile, by then the tires are warmed up and running and I can open her up.

Don't know if yo uever intend to off road, but when you install the long line, do it in smaller sections, that way if you have an off and puncture the line you only have to replace a small part of it.

Also when you connect it to the Manifold you can put the tube on your tounge with the bike running and it will GENTLY suck the tip, its a very quick way of checking its working (helpful for fault finding).

Just my observations from using it for the last 12,000 miles.

(Not so) Great Scott!
 

My experiences with Scottoilers haven't been the most positive. I've used them on a couple of my bikes and had varying results.

I used one on a 2005 Ninja 636, and it kept the chain in quite good nick, but then I bought one for my DRZ, and just had problem after problem with it. I spent more time fettling and fixing than I ever would have spent lubing manually. And paid through the nose for the privelege.

I just rely on hand lubing (ooo-er) now, or more often non-lubing!

Everyone knows that orange chains work best anyway!

Happy Riding.

i have a Scottoiler with lubetube on my TDM and a loobman on my XTZ
the dual nozzle on the loobman is better than the scott oiler one which seems to get clogged up
the loobman comes with a dual nozzle as standard, just the dual nozzle for the scottoiler costs more than the entire loobman inc postage
also the drip rate on the scotty is very difficult to setup correctly if you are riding in a mix of temperatures and altitudes
the loobman is easy to use, you just squeeze it whenever filling up with fuel (they recommend once every 100miles, obviously more if in bad weather)
note that it will drip oil even if stationary after the squeeze, so i mounted mine where i can reach behind me and squeeze the bottle as i ride away

i use scott oil in both the systems, yes the oil is expensive, but i bought a job lot of it a few years ago and still working my way thru it

with the loobman if you are going offroad and want to avoid the grinding paste you simple dont use it, with the scottyoiler you have to adjust it and in my experience its almost impossible to switch it off without disconnecting the vaccum hose

the loobman gets my vote :thumbup1: