Crud Guards for a Defy?

[andytheflyer]

Hi,

Those urban warriors amongst us will not know what I'm going to go on about - but if you live in cow country you will - cowsh!t on the roads is the payback for us country folk not having city-dwelling WVM and left hooking skip trucks to deal with.

Only a mile into my 30 miler today I'd already passed 2 farms where the cows had just come in for milking - and they do this twice a day. It got so bad at one point that I was having to fight to keep the front wheel turning. Very depressing when there's most of the ride to go. It gets worse because the friction of the tyre rubbing warms up the mud/cowsh!t mix and you end up with an adobe brick moulded and then baked around the fork bridge and brake. Riding through puddles to clean out the gap wasn't an option today as there weren't any - the dew carried off the fields by the cows was enough to deposit 10mm of slurry along a half mile stretch at one point.

I have the authentic Defy mudguards - and they are a close fit. Has anyone tried the Crud guards on a Defy? I wonder if they will give me a little more clearance - or maybe I'll just end up with a larger brick moulded around the brake.

Not sure how to post a photo here so hope this works - but maybe not if you are having your tea!

 

[ColinJ]

I'm a fan of the Cruds but if you have clogging problems with other guards, then you probably will with the Roadracers too.

I went on one forum ride and really struggled. I knew that something was wrong when I was working hard to do 20 mph downhill, where I'd normally be doing 30 mph freewheeling. It turned out that my back guard was solid with mud.

Nowadays, I make sure to avoid riding through mud and crap where possible, but if I do, I ride through (shallow) puddles afterwards to sluice it out before it gets the chance to build up. Bike cleaning after rides on wet days includes spraying water under the Roadracers. (I use a 5L pump-up garden spray - ideal if, like me, you don't have a convenient tap for a hose.)

PS I've just taken a close look at the photo - I think you will struggle with any guards with that amount of crap! There are a few farms round here whose herds foul the roads when being moved between fields so I try and avoid them.

 

[andytheflyer]

I'm a fan of the Cruds but if you have clogging problems with other guards, then you probably will with the Roadracers too.

I went on one forum ride and really struggled. I knew that something was wrong when I was working hard to do 20 mph downhill, where I'd normally be doing 30 mph freewheeling. It turned out that my back guard was solid with mud.

Nowadays, I make sure to avoid riding through mud and crap where possible, but if I do, I ride through (shallow) puddles afterwards to sluice it out before it gets the chance to build up. Bike cleaning after rides on wet days includes spraying water under the Roadracers. (I use a 5L pump-up garden spray - ideal if, like me, you don't have a convenient tap for a hose.)

PS I've just taken a close look at the photo - I think you will struggle with any guards with that amount of crap! There are a few farms round here whose herds foul the roads when being moved between fields so I try and avoid them.

Hi Colin,

Thanks for the advice - and maybe I suspected that might be the case. Not sure that I can plot on a map (say BikeHike) where the cows cross the road in Cheshire and North Shropshire so I can avoid them - maybe I'll have to plot a route then study the satellite image to see if cow crossings are a possibility! I cannot describe the feeling on rounding a bend and seeing on the road ahead the aftermath of milking at this time of year - I don't mind cowsh!t on my walking boots but I don't want it jammed up my mudguards and brakes!

The amount of crap in the photo is instructive - you only have to ride 20 or 30 m through this stuff to get that effect - I'd cleared it 2 or 3 times in 30 miles as best as I could! One stretch of about half a mile was particularly soul-destroying!

Hopefully the cows will be back indoors for the winter in a week or 2! Then the problem goes away - until the farmers start silaging maize.............

 

[ColinJ]

Six or seven times, I rode the Manchester 100 which covers a lot of small roads in Cheshire. There was one particular farm which always used to have a lot of slurry on the road outside it each year. It was in a really dodgy place just round a fast RH bend. I nearly went down when I hit it one year, and I found out that there had been carnage when a chaingang went down earlier in the day. I think one rider broke his pelvis or hip.

 

[Rohloff_Brompton_Rider]

use the mtb style crud guards. not as effective as normal guards but they do work and they won't ever get clogged as they're too far from the tyres.