I’ve never had much luck with fenders. This is not a recent development, I've had this problem all my life. I remember my bright college days, when I had a variety of three speeds. The would start out all new and shiny, and gradually execute a striptease worthy of Gypsy Rose Lee, as one by one the fenders, the chainguard, etc., would come off because it was dinged beyond recognition. This was not the result of spectacular crashes, but just general attrition. I came to the conclusion that I was very hard on equipment.
When I entered the ten speed arena, fenders were not an issue since your basic "racer" didn't have them and they were considered very uncool. As I got more deeply embroiled in biking, and acquired a semi-permanent stripe up the back of most of my cycling garb, I thought about fenders again,
I first tried one of those cheapo plastic things that attached to the seat tube, and is about nine inches long. It's claim to fame was that it was light and easy to take on and off. Needless to say, it was pretty useless, aside from the placebo effect. Might as well hold your hand over the rear wheel. But it was easy to take off when I decided to retire it.
My next foray into fenders were Zefal fenders with the little metal struts. These have the advantage of being extremely malleable. That is, you could bend them to about any shape you wanted. The drawback was that they seemed to bend by themselves to shapes I didn't want usually in close proximity to the tire. I would discover a problem of adjustment shortly after the tire had worn a nice hole in the fender. So I would bend up the front just enough so it wasn't touching the tire anymore, which inevitably resulted in the other end touching the tire and creating a matching hole in the fender at the other end.
I went fenderless for a number of years, till I was enticed by a sale at Nashbar to buy another set, which I installed on #3 commuting bike. This bike is pretty much dedicated to riding in the rain, so it needed them. I managed to ride these for a good while without trashing them, but I eventually did away with the rear fender since I couldn't figure out a good way of brushing broken glass off the tire with it on. So now I have one bike with fender on the front only.
Those of you who are fender literate realize that a fender is really half an item without a mudflap. Now I really wanted one of those mudflaps you see on Mack trucks with a little guy with two six guns and a sign that says "Back off." But I figured that if I mounted one of those I might have a problem with pedal clearance. So, I had this pair of jeans from days of yore. They were bell-bottoms and had a rather large stain from where I spilled salad dressing on them, so I eventually succumbed to spouse pressure and stopped wearing them. Being a thrifty Yankee, I converted them into a pair of cutoffs and a lifetime supply of mudflap material. Who says I don't recycle?
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