I'm not the world's best bike mechanic, but neither am I a novice. The first pair of plastic fenders I worked with were Bluemels, from the late 70's. Around the turn of the millennium I first installed a pair of SKS fenders. It seemed pretty straight forward and simple. You attached them to the brake bolt and drop outs, threaded the stays through a metal hole, and tightened a nut. You could trim the stays if you wanted to or just put a little plastic cap over the end. Finally you fussed with the alignment. You were done, until they came out of alignment. I migrated to metal fenders. They are just a bit more challenging, I needed to be more careful in getting them aligned, but once that was done, they would stay put for years.
Two years ago I bought a pair of the cream "longboys" to replace a broken eight year old Honjo on my Ram. At that time I discovered that SKS had decided to make one small change and complicated installation immensely. The little plastic cap that fit over the end of the stay has been replaced with an integrated plastic anchor. Presumably these will keep the cap on the stay, but they also require threading the stay while holding the screw and bolt in place. They also limit how far the stay can go past the bolt, so that the stay must be cut before you get a good look at how long you want them to be. All together annoying. Anyway, it turned out I didn't like the cream against the Ram blue, so I replaced them with VO aluminum. Yesterday I put those SKS fenders on my daughters new Chevy-ut. What a PIA. The third time one or more of the little stay bolts popped out all over the floor while I was trying to mate up its sister I swore I would never work on plastic fenders again. Then, with the stays perhaps a few mm too long I struggled for a long time trying simultaneously to line up the arch and remove a persistent twist. Give me a good metal fender any day. They just require care, not three hands and a box full of ambidextrous luck. BTW, just bar tape & kickstand to go on the Cheviut. Hopefully pictures, later today. Michael -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "RBW Owners Bunch" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to [email protected]. To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. Visit this group at https://groups.google.com/group/rbw-owners-bunch. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.
