Portland Design Works
Lets face it, your fat bike allows you to ride when conditions are not conducive to your 'regular weather bike'. Conditions are usually snowy, wet and sloppy or soft terrain where you have the chance of getting off your bike with a 'racing stripe' up your back. Who wants to clean the car seat of mud, sand and water after your ride? The Mud-Shovel is wide enough to cover my 4.5" fat tire, long enough to avoid that racing stripe. Easy on, easy off and the rubberized adjustable strap keeps it firmly in place on the seat post. I personally don't like the look of a fender on any of my bikes, but the trade off of a clean back is worth it. Rode with it for one winter season so far and this is the best of the fenders I have for any of my bikes - it stays put once its on, no slipping, drooping and doesn't twist around on the seatpost.
I gave these Portland Design Works fenders 3-stars because while they seem to be reasonably well made and likely fairly durable, installation is not a given. If the description would simply be more forthright in the likelihood that many bikes (especially a road bike with rim caliper brakes), are not going to have a clean install, then the rating would go up - a more informed decision before buying. But most people want a product that, you know. . . can be installed. And you can't really know about this issue until you're knee deep into modifications and then it's too late to return them.
I would say pass on this if you have a caliper style, rim brake system. I've done a LOT of mods on all kinds of things yet I'm still working on making my own brackets for these fenders - the clearance between the tires and calipers is going to be your issue.
You almost certainly will not be able to fit this to a disc brake bike with the included hardware. In my case that required stopping the job and paying $5 plus shipping to get spacers from PDW to fit the front fender, adding over a week to completion. The rear is worse as the stays are too short to reach the eyelets; I ended up mounting one to the bike's rack and mounting the second stay to the first.
This is the fourth set of fenders I've installed and far and away the worst experience.
I'm curious what the use case is here? Caliper-equipped 26" 650b conversions? In any event, this is my last PDW purchase.
On the bright side, now that they're mounted the fenders are stout. Not a rattle, and if they were any stronger they'd become a structural part of the bike. They also look like a premium part.
