A couple of years after announcing its first “maintenance free” Z-Ring HPE motorcycle chain, Regina is now offering the same technology in a chain for mid-displacement motorcycles.
Regina’s maintenance-free chain first came to prominence in with BMW, when that company announced the M Endurance chain in 2020 with the tagline “Lubricating your chain was yesterday. Maintenance-free like the shaft drive for the first time.” That 525-pitch chain was actually manufactured by Regina. Of course, a 525-pitch chain is useless if your bike doesn’t run that size, so Regina is now offering a smaller chain for middleweight motorcycles. Many, many bikes in the 300-650cc range run 520 chains, so this is good news for someone who wants to streamline the maintenance schedule for their small-cc bike.
The 520-pitch chain uses the same basic design as the 525-pitch chain, with a low-friction coating that reduces the need for lubrication. As per the press release:
Available as early as this November, the new 520 Regina HPE chain contains all the unique and successful features of its bigger sister. Among the most important is the Tetrahedral Amorphous Carbon (ta-C) coating developed by Regina technicians and applied to the surfaces of the chain bushes and rollers, which guarantees resistance, smoothness and, above all, allows to eliminate the periodic re-lubrication carried out by the rider every 500 km. An exclusive feature that, in addition to increasing its efficiency and duration, minimizes the environmental impact produced by splashes of lubricant while riding.
Finally, thanks to the important production volumes achieved in recent years with the HPE 525 chain,
Regina has managed to develop economies of scale that have allowed the Italian company to reduce the production costs of these chains.
Well, lower prices sounds good, at least. But if you do some quick Google-fu, you’ll find that these chains are not the “maintenance-free” wonder that BMW originally promised; you’ve still got to clean them, and tighten their slack as they wear. If you’re OK with that, then there’s a lot to like about a chain that needs less fussing about than a standard O-ring or X-ring setup. On a smallbore bike, this chain should last a very, very long time with minimal maintenance, as your CBR300 isn’t exactly hard on a sturdy motorcycle chain. This could be a great upgrade for commuters, in particular.
We haven’t seen any talk about Canadian pricing or availability for the new Regina chains; the best advice would be to ask your local dealer to find out.
