Whats the best mudguards to get???

[BentMikey]

Bonj, your a mook.

 

[magnatom]

I hadn't looked at this thread as I'm no expert on mudguards. However, it would appear that you don't need to be an expert (or even have anything remotely resembling the slightest inkling of a smidgen of a speck of knowledge). So I'll put in my 2p worth...... I have a niggling feeling that bonj might, just might, not be right. Call me crazy, but that's just what I think. No hard feelings of course bonj.

 

[Chris James]

Bonj, of course you are allowed to have your opinion, but equally it is okay of other people say you are wrong (in the same way that you say they are wrong).

Since the OP asked about mudguards then it is only fair that others step in when they see your advice if they believe it to be wrong. Otherwise it would imply that everyone else is in agreement with you.

You dislike mudguards, that's fine, but it seems to be based on your belief that they are heavy and rattle (not true).

Also, mudguards are not there to protect you from the rain (how would they do that?) but from spray that is produced as you ride across a wet road. You may consider that modern advances in road building make them unnecessary(which advances specifically? As far as I am aware we have been building roads in the same way for decades). But simply looking at a road after it has rained demonstrates that there is standing water on the road after it has rained - thereby completely contradicting your assertion.

Your advice is only good if you only ride on days when there is no standing water / dampness on the roads. Which rules out most of the winter months. I remind you that this is the commuting forum so unless the OP is only planning on commuting on dry days then your advice is flawed.

As far as suddenly suggesting that the OP shouldn't get guards because no roadie uses them - well that is wrong too. Turn up on a club run without guards on a wet day and you may find yourself cycling on your own. Guards are a matter of courtesy to others who you ride with by not spraying them with crap.

Also, from your previous posting history I was not aware that you were a roadie anyway.

 

[domtyler]

SKS Chromoplastics here too, they work, what more can be said?

They can be quite a pain to fit though so it might be worth just letting your LBS have the privilege of fitting them for you.

 

[Milo]

Bonj shut up.

 

[beancounter]

I'm only new here but even I've realised three things:-

1. some people post good stuff
2. some people post tripe
3. the forum has an "ignore" option

My advice is to use item 3 for item 2. Everyone's a winner!

Regards,

bc

 

[jiggerypokery]

Uh?

Roadies don't use mudguards?
Skinny treadless tyres don't throw up spray?

I need to revisit both of my roadbikes and the way I ride them as I must be the problem rather than the rain/trye/road interface that I stupidly thought required a mudguard or two to prevent my arse from getting a good soaking.

My PlanetX carbon road bling - mudguards for rainy days and club rides
My planet X TT uber bling ..... mudguards the other Sunday morning when it was lashing it down...I have no shame

And who said this was a road forum...it's a cycling forum for all types of bikes irrespective of being skinny or knobly...or so I thought.

 

[magnatom]

I should also point out that Glasgow has enough problems keeping the roads pothole free, never mind installing these spray-less mud-less roads. Especially in the winter the roads get absolutely manky and if I didn't have mudguards I would look like my son did yesterday with sh&t all the way up his back! (he has a nasty wee sickness and diarrhoea bug at the moment. His superpoos are something to behold

 

[jiggerypokery]

I'm laughing with you Magnatom...though my son has been with us for 7 months now we've managed to avoid any exploding up the back nappy scenarios...untill 4am yesterday when the shoot literaly hit the fan and Finlay woke up to let us know...poor kid. I think this was worse than the black/green poo of the early days.

Poor me too actually as I had to beout oof the house just ober an hour later to catch a plane, can safely say I am not working effectively right now due to lack of sleep, too much beer last night and trying to watch football in a French bar with Americans asking stupid questions. the best of which being - "is this being played in Manchester?".

I worked as a surf instructor for a few years and when the kids asked to leave the water to go to the loo we always said pee in your wetsuits it'll warm you up. One kid went a little far with this instruction and did what comes naturaly! So when it came to the point where we had to strip the wetsuit off this lad...well....lets just say that in a confined space a little shoot goes a long way lol, it was up his shoulders, down his legs had to make him wash in the sea before we would let him in the van to go home lol

 

[alecstilleyedye]

i have the sks ones. i've taken them off the summer, as the low clearance on the front means i can't put more than 100psi in the tyre. and i have to occasionally bend the stays to stop them rubbing.

i think i'll be keeping the winter bike for non commuting only, and using the mtb for the winter commute, so i may not put them back on.

 

[walker]

wider tyres on the road are unnecessary, and are the primary reason why a lot of people think they need mudguards. Thinner, slicker tyres don't get muddy water sticking to them and as such the splash-up only gets a few inches with my 25mm michelin P2Rs. 28mm with nobbles on - COURSE you're going to get muddy... It's like tying a towel round the tap when you're fixing the washer - just turn the water off Too many people on here suffer from "I-might-go-down-a-towpath" syndrome. There's two disciplines of cycling - road cycling, and mountain biking. This happens to be a ROAD bike forum. People shouldn't try and pretend there's some middle ground to which they belong of being neither one nor the other but just a 'generic cyclist' - just admit you're a roadie and do things the roadie way. And that doesn't mean mudguards. Mudguards are old fashioned becasue they were only really necessary in olden days when there actually WAS a lot of mud on roads and lots of water aswell due to roadbuilding technology not having advanced as far as providing effective drainage.

If you was part of a club, a majority of clubs would not let you ride in a group without guards in the winter, no matter what the weather was like

 

[dantheman]

well, im glad i posted this question now, as not only did i get the answer i needed, i also get to read some nice little arguements as well, bonus!

- cant wait till we get some of those "state of the art" new roads round here though, they sound pretty darn good. maybe if they are all done before winter, the price of mudguards will drop to pennies, and then i can buy some just to look stupid!!! (because obviously thats what theyre made for "innit")

 

[Milo]

Dont worry about bonj hes had to many e numbers again.

 

[Chuffy]

If you was part of a club, a majority of clubs would not let you ride in a group without guards in the winter, no matter what the weather was like

I still get a faceful when I ride behind Baggy on account of her not having a rear flap to keep the spray arc down far enough.
For those of a filthy disposition, enjoy.

Oh and I presume the 8 hour soaking that I got from my Schwalbe Blizzard 23s (which gave me a nastily chafed and scabby perineum) was just my imagination?

Silly bugger.

 

[bonj2]

Bonj, of course you are allowed to have your opinion, but equally it is okay of other people say you are wrong (in the same way that you say they are wrong).

Course, that's fine - but I don't see the need to throw toys out of the pram in a huff and stamp your feet up and down having a little screaming strop like tdrinka.

Since the OP asked about mudguards then it is only fair that others step in when they see your advice if they believe it to be wrong. Otherwise it would imply that everyone else is in agreement with you.

If about 9 people post that they recommend mudguards, then one person posts that they think mudguards are unnecessary, it doesn't take much brainpower to realise that the one and the nine aren't in agreement with each other. People who ask questions on here do so because they want advice from other people, not because they're stupid. 'Beginners' and 'newbies' are just that, beginners to cycling, it doesn't mean they're idiots and need every single thing explaining to them. If what they want to take away from a thread is the gist of the general consensus, then they don't need you to explain the fact that the minority of opinion is just that, a minority - they can see that for themselves. If what they want is a unanimous opinion, then - well, I'm sorry - they're not going to get that - and there's not much that you can do about it, short of setting up your own cycling forum called www.mudguards.co.uk where all that is ever talked about is mudguards.

You dislike mudguards, that's fine, but it seems to be based on your belief that they are heavy and rattle (not true).

[/quote]
I mainly dislike them on the grounds that they are unnecessary, but what irks me about them is people such as tdrinka who aren't content with simply using them themselves, but also feeling the need to throw a wobbly whenever I dare to suggest not using them. It almost them feels like I haven't advocated not using them enough - and I get the urge to slag them off even more when the next such thread comes along.

Also, mudguards are not there to protect you from the rain (how would they do that?) but from spray that is produced as you ride across a wet road.

What i don't get is, what is the advantage in trying to protect yourself from the water spraying up from the road when there is lots more water falling down as rain which is causing you to get a lot more wet than from the water sprayed up from the road anyway.

Your advice is only good if you only ride on days when there is no standing water / dampness on the roads. Which rules out most of the winter months. I remind you that this is the commuting forum so unless the OP is only planning on commuting on dry days then your advice is flawed.

The need for mudguards also assumes that all the following are true:
(a) there is standing water AND mud on the road, in the right consistency for the water to hold some of the mud when sprayed up,
( it isn't currently raining any more
(c) he works all day in what he cycles in
(d) it matters that he isn't muddy at work.

when you consider all those, it's not actually that common for all those to be true. That's probably why I've found through experience that I've never needed mudguards.
The reasoning for the above:
(a) if there is no mud, the only water will spray up and will just run off and not leave any muddy marks. if there is no water (e.g. mud but just dry mud) then it won't spray up.
( if it's still raining, the rain falling on his back will wash the mud off.
(c) if you get a bit of mud spray on you but you get changed into something clean then what does it matter?
(d) if you've got an outdoorsy-type job where you might get muddy anyway then again it doesn't matter.

I think the reason I personally don't need mudguards is a combination of mainly (, the rain washes it off, and a little bit of (a), there isn't THAT much mud on the road anyway as it's fairly urban, not that many farms, etc., and a tiny bit of (c) I get changed at work anyway.

As far as suddenly suggesting that the OP shouldn't get guards because no roadie uses them - well that is wrong too. Turn up on a club run without guards on a wet day and you may find yourself cycling on your own. Guards are a matter of courtesy to others who you ride with by not spraying them with crap.

If you was part of a club, a majority of clubs would not let you ride in a group without guards in the winter, no matter what the weather was like

The fact that club runs insist on them must mean one of two things - (a) they ride in close packs on muddy roads at sufficient speed that the spray is fairly parallel to the road and is more likely to hit the cyclist behind than the originating one, (B) the notion that all cyclists MUST have mudguards is fairly
well and truly ingrained into the cycling community.

and I didn't say NO roadie uses them. Find me where i said that. I don't think i did but if i did i'm mistaken.

Also, from your previous posting history I was not aware that you were a roadie anyway.

yes, didn't used to be but am now.

Bonj shut up.

oh keep your hair on miloat.