I don't know if you remember or not, but a while back I posted about a set of custom made leopard wood fenders?? Well, my mom obviously reads my blog, because she ordered them for me for my birthday.
When I opened them I was REALLY surprised. I wasn't expecting them at all. I had grown to think that I would just leave the bike without fenders, but when I saw them I knew that I had needed them all along.
I got home and put them on. It took a bit of work, as the Fat Frank tires make mounting fenders conventionally virtually impossible. To mount the rear one where fenders normally are, I would have had to break a support piece off of the bike, and I wasn't really comfortable doing that for obvious reasons, so instead I ended up installing it in a "street sweeper" fender style. That's a style of fender that goes from the seat post all the way to what is essentially the ground at the back of the bike. It went on like that REALLY well. I managed to put a small scratch in it, which ticked me off, but then I realized it was just in the clear and wax coats, so it should easily buff out. I'll repair the scratch on my days off this week. I will also probably replace the bolt that's mounting it to the seat area, because that one seems a bit small for the spot. If not the bolt, I'll definitely be adding some washers to it. Either of those options should resolve the possible issue of the bolt slipping through the mount piece. I could also possibly look for a replacement mount piece. The one that is on there is adjustable, and it's just a small piece of metal. I already know what I would replace it with, and they cost about 12 cents at home depot. But I don't think that will be necessary. In fact, I think the washers will be enough.
This is what the back fender looks like. Not the greatest photos, it was dark out, but I'll get some better ones soon. But I think you get the point. This picture shows the back one from an angle, so that you can see what the wood looks like. The leopard wood looks GREAT. The purple stringers on the side are really similar to the color of the bike, so that's awesome. And the stripes down the middle of it set it off just perfectly.
Here's another picture of the back one, and in this one you can more clearly see what I mean by saying it goes down nearly to the ground. You can also see that it's effectively just a flat fender, which accomplishes another thing. From the side, you can still see the awesome fat profile of the Fat Frank tires and how well they match the wheels. But from the top you can clearly see the fender. Gives the bike the best of both worlds, really. You have an added fender, but don't have the negative side of having the fender cover the awesome tires too much.
The fender goes down REALLY low to the ground. But it's not so low that it scrapes at all. In fact, I'm pretty sure the only time it would scrape anything is if you went through a REALLY deep pot hole. Other than that, I'm not worried at all about it getting scraped on the ground while I ride it.
The front fender took a bit of custom work as well to get it to mount. The fork doesn't have a spot to mount a fender, and the old fender was mounted with what was essentially a dowel shoved into the bottom of the fork. I was able to work around those issues and get the front installed pretty solidly as well. I had to trim the fender a bit to get it to fit between the fork legs, but that is normal for the fenders. I will have to take it off soon to re-seal the wood, but that's not a big deal at all.
Here's the front fender from the direct side. You can see how closely it hugs the wheel, which looks awesome on the bike.
And here's one from the angle so that you can see how awesome the fender looks overall. It fits GREAT on the front wheel!!!
Overall, I'm REALLY happy with the way the fenders look on the bike. I have a bit of work to do to get them finished up, like resealing that front one where I trimmed it, adding the washers or different mount to the rear, and resealing/waxing the scratch on the back one...but other than that they were a straight forward install that looks fantastic.
Awesome.
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