Fenders

>--- Noemi wrote:
>Leave those low fenders
>at home. A mud-collecting stock R100GS fender might have been a
>liability in the frequent mudholes/puddles. Perhaps a high front
>fender is an "adventure" aspect of "adventure-tour," especially
>since it isn't as well-suited to the "tour" part.
>--- end of quoted material ---
>
>Anyone know of a way to get to use both? It looks like I'd have to remove my
>forks and disconnect a brake line to remove my low fender. That's too much
>work to do more than once, and I'm sometimes really glad to have that low
>fender. Has anyone seen a mod. or aftermarket solution that allows quicker
>fender conversions?
>-Allen

I recently put an Acerbis high fender on my '91 R100GS/PD. At the time I installed it I was too lazy/busy (take your pick) to do it the "correct" way by disconnecting the front brake line. What I did instead was to use a coping saw (a Dremmel tool would also work) to make a slot in the fender from the hole through which the brake line passed, forward to edge near the rear, inside of the fork leg. I didn't/don't have any intention of remounting the low fender, but I think it would work OK. If I were to do it, I'd probably fashion a small aluminum backing plate which would span the slot and add support. I'd attach it with a combination of several sheet metal screws or machine bolts and/or the screw which fastens the fender to the fork. This could all be done fairly unobtrusively I think.

Regarding the benefits of the low fender, I have no doubt that a low fender would have reduced the amount of mud on Noemi and I on our recent trip to the Copper Canyon. However, I'm also fairly sure, as Noemi already pointed out, that we probably would have had several incidents of the front wheel locking up with mud, had our bikes had low fenders.

For some reason, in our mud encounters, I'd generally come out much muddier than Noemi. I think it had a lot to do with my testosterone- based approach of gassing it and powering/sliding through, whereas Noemi took a more "plodding" approach at slower speeds. For the most part, her approach worked as well as mine and kept her a lot cleaner. However there were a couple monster mud-holes, one of which gave a truck driver a run for his money as we watched, which obviously required speed and momentum to get through. I rode Noemi's bike through these using the testosterone-based technique. As it was, the biggest of these mudholes had my bike's back end doing some major fishtailing before I ran into a fence, but stayed upright and on the bike, and rode on out the other side of the hole. On TweetyBike, the same mudhole got me sideways in a major way and only a well-placed dab and a handful of throttle got me through upright.

The only time I saw Noemi come out dirtier than I was when she inexplicably rode through the gigantic mud puddle on the right side track rather than through the little one on the left.

I guess, the other benefit of the low fender is that the mud-covered bike and Aerostich which result do make for some pretty interesting looks when you ride into a small Mexican village. Maybe that's why we never had any "bad" person-to-person experiences. They all thought we were a bunch of bad-ass gringo bikers, rather than the computer-geeks we really are.

-- Doug Ruth         | SRI International    | '91 BMW R100GS PD | AMA #:197665
-- druth@erg.sri.com | 333 Ravenswood Ave.  |    Lic. #:BMBLBMW |
-- Work:415-859-3860 | Menlo Park, CA 94025 | '81 BMW R100G/S PD|
-- Home:415-969-5071 |                      | '87 Honda XR600R  |