Trail friendly front fender

[Mat Grewe]

Howdy folks,

I sent Will some pictures recently of my trail friendly fenders and he ended up posting them on his latest Riv email.  The rear fender is also anti-collapsible via direct to rack mounting.  Here are a couple of pictures, but this was a homebrew custom job that has far exceeded my expectations.  If you can handle getting more gunk on your feet/lower bottle and want to stop cowpies from getting stuck in your fender (yes, this has happened on more than one occasion), then fabricating this type of fender might be worth the time investment.

This is on a custom bike where I had the builder add extra bosses along the downtube as well as a tab on the bottom bracket.  But this could be accomplished on a factory bike with King Cage USBs no problem.  Cutting and bending the thin sheet of aluminum wasn't as hard or timely as I was expecting, but I did recently install a thicker steel metal roof, so bending this fender by comparison was WAYYYY easier.

If folks here have interest in reproducing these fenders on their own, hit me up and I can share more what I did and what I would do differently.  If you think it is stupid, I don't care, they've worked splendidly for me over the past few thousand miles of heavy rain, sopping wet gravel, sleet/snow, sand, mud, and beauty paved roads.

Oh, and the custom bike has a geometry based off of the Atlantis, with some nudges  here and there to accommodate my fit oddities.  Rides great!

Mat

[Mat Grewe]

More front fender pictures.

[Mat Grewe]

And the rear fender.

[Patrick Moore]

That's both clever and well done. I've made similar "splash guard" systems, though much cruder, for various mountain bikes using black plastic and zip ties; protection is not as good as with "real" fenders but far better than clip-on shorties or nothing.

Will you please post the obligatory right-side profile photo, valves at 12 o'clock and cranks horizontal? (Seriously, would like to see a picture of the whole bike.)

But I'm curious: Why not just use regular fenders on this bike with road tires, especially with all that clearance? I'd consider this -- again, very well done -- only for knobby tires.

My Matthews 1:1 has full Kelpie (custom fit to the bike) fenders and I've had absolutely no problems; for that matter, none either with many other dirt road bikes with full fenders over fat smooth tires.

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Patrick Moore

Alburquerque, Nuevo Mexico, Etats Unis d'Amerique, Orbis Terrarum

[Eric Daume]

Seriously, Patrick? Everyone knows the valves should be at 6:00.

Eric

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[Patrick Moore]

I was obviously thinking of the southern hemisphere.

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[ascpgh]

Grant has said DS photos should place the right crank at 2 o'clock, inviting your first pedal stroke. 

Andy Cheatham

Pittsburgh

[Mat Grewe]

Ha, I actually have no camera that takes clear photos (old laptop and cheap flip phone, both unworthy cameras).  These were taken by a friend who was honing in on just the fenders.  So it may be a while before full bike photos for this machine exist.  And when I am away from internet (don't have internet at home) and these conversations, I don't seem to remember to get a photo...

The bike was built to also have room for wider knobbies.  Unfortunately the builder messed up a couple things in the rear triangle, so I am limited to 50mm tires instead of the requested 57mm, although the front has the clearance I requested.  I'm fine with it really, I pretty much only run 50mm slick tires anyway, at least in the summer.  I still may put on a wider knobbie front tire if I end up doing a longer off-road tour, but I really have had no issue riding rough roads with 50mm slicks.  Winter I do put on studded, lightly knobbed tires.

My old bike had well installed Honjo fenders with 25-30mm clearance and I had numerous issues, even with slicks: the afore mentioned cowpies, leafs and mud, snow/ice buildup, and a stick flipped up into the spokes of my front wheel and nearly collapsed the front fender.  Thankfully that didn't happen, but the stays still got bent and required a fix.  Na, even with slicks I am supremely happy with the homebrew front fender.  And I forgot to mention, it wasn't my idea.  I got the idea from a MTB forum where the guy made it out of coroplast and zip ties, but this is arguably stronger and more elegant than what the MTB poster deemed "fugly."

Mat

Driftless Wisconsin

[lconley]

Valve stems should be @ 12:00 in photos because the tire logo should be aligned with the valve stem and if the valve stem is @ 6:00 the tire logo is upside down.

Laing

Like the T-shirt says: "I am a mechanical engineer-  to save time, let's just assume that I am never wrong"

[Patrick Moore]

I admire your indifference to digital technology. I must use it for my work, though I am more thoroughly enmeshed in it that I need be, but every time the developers come up with a new and "improved" OS or application, I curse the added complexity that adds little if any benefit (like increasing the steps to 4 to put an email message or text message in the trash, or "hover" windows that block what you are typing just to give you information you don't need).

But again, very well done fender alternative.

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[Mat Grewe]

Ha, it's not that admirable really...  I am wayyyy too easily distracted (case in point, I should be working, but am responding to a bike forum), so minimizing the tech in my home is the only way I can get anything done!!  Fabricating this fender took far longer than it ought to have simply because I was living at my brother's house (with internet) so I could work remote during the early phases of COVID.  Thankfully my office opened back up in August last year for the handful of folks like me so I could move back home and get back to bike commuting instead of sitting on my tush binging on Star Wars and pizza...

Mat

Quarantined in the big city of St. Paul, MN, but gleefully back off the grid in the rolling hills of the Driftless Region in Southwest WI