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  • Bit of a dilemma for me. Currently running 65mm Bluemels on top of 27.5 x 2.25 tyres on my Bridge Club and while they fit, there is too much side-to-side flexibility, and every time I hit a bump, the front mudguard in particular swings to the side and hits the tyre, making an unpleasant and slightly worrying noise. This is possibly also because, while they do fit over the tyres, the tyres are fatter / clearance smaller than SKS recommend. @Haistelija you've got similar sized tyres under the same Bluemels, do they work ok for you?

    The frame will happily take much fatter mudguards, but if they are still just as wobbly, I worry the same problem will occur. So that rules out just replacing with 69mm Bluemels for £40, which are in any event only 4mm wider.

    I could go for 75mm Bluemels Style for £55. These are both significantly fatter, and possibly going to be less flexy due to the stays being a single rod that is bent around and clipped in place, rather than each side having its own straight rod held in place with the traditional fiddly grabber things? They are aesthetically very challenging though.

    Alternatively I could spring for metal mudguards, which would surely be stiffer. I've used Velo Orange and Gilles Berthoud in the past very happily but they don't make any fat enough. I'm not prepared to do any re-radiusing. PDW do 650Beast in 65mm for £120ish but a) they are seemingly out of stock everywhere and b) I'd still technically be exceeding the manufacturer recommended max tyre size, which for the PDWs is 2.2".

    So, that brings me to the the £190 Simworks/Honjo 74mm. This is obviously far more than I'd like to spend on mudguards but if they are gonna do a brilliant job and last forever, I could stomach it. But @Skülly says he's broken two pairs and Simworks themselves provide an extremely un-reassuring article washing their hands of any responsibility for cracks.

    So what would you do if you were me? Stick to plastic, cheap and v ugly with Bluemels Style? Or go for Honjo and risk the world's most expensive mudguards cracking in short order?


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  • You could use a long bolt and some spacers to connect the front part of the mudguard to the rack

  • the front mudguard in particular swings to the side and hits the tyre

    Is this the only issue you're trying to solve?

    The other potential issues you mentioned don't sound like they impact you at the moment.

    In which case I think you want to increase the support on the front of the front mudguard.

    I used someone else's pic because it's side on, but you get the idea....

    I'd do this first as its the lowest effort. You can buy Gilles Berthoud struts separately so that would be a good route to adding support to the front.

    Then probably the 75mm Bluemels Style, as Imo they have a utilitarian charm to them which would suit a functional bike.

  • I've had the Bluemels Style 75's on a bridge club with same wheel/tyre size and found they worked really well.

  • I've used Bluemels Style 75s on my Bridge Club with the same wheel/tyre size and found they worked really well...

  • similar sized tyres under the same Bluemels, do they work ok for you?

    Yeah they definitely rattle a bit and in the same spot as yours. Wider fender or stronger struts might help but I'm not worried as every single pair of Bluemels installed I've installed rattle at least a bit.

  • Gilles Berthoud? Do they come wide enough? Order 700xWidest and re-radius?

    Re: mudguard wiggle… double the stays. Done this on 26x60mm GBs on my Thorn, works a treat.

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