So I was idling around the interwebs, looking for pretty fenders, when I noticed that some fenders are advertised as compatible with disc brakes and some are not. I've been riding a bike with disc brakes for all of a month now and am a little bit baffled. Do any of you riders of bikes with disc brakes have fender recommendations? I have a Jamis Coda Elite, and my main requirement for fenders is that they do not rattle because rattling will make me lose my mind. (And I kind of want pretty, but I can bend there. The bike is all black.)

Jamis Coda Elite has a chainstay disc mount, not the normal MTB seatstay mount. Rack and fender attachment are exactly the same as for normal bikes, you don't need special "disc compatible" models. SKS chromoplastic fenders are the goto model.
At the front, you may have to bend the fender stays under the disc brake to get to the mounting eyelet.

I use Avenir clip on fenders. They look good with fatter tires but lousy with skinnier tires. They cost $10 and go on and off in seconds AND they actually work well in the wet.

I just bought spacers at the hardware store and bent stuff a lot.
details on my dull blog here.


Motobecane Phantom Outlaw fender strut spacers by ccorlew, on Flickr

Have a Surly Karate Monkey, with Disc. ( Avid ) all black,and put PB , Cascadia Fenders, built from frame up, had to use spacers and long bolts to clear rotor, in places, and made a bracket at fork mount. Solid with no rattles

I used SKS Chromoplastics. Our rear disc is on the chain stay so had no issues with fender install. On the front I used a small 5mm spacer and strategically bent the fender stay around the caliper.

You, as shown above, adapt the fit to your bike .. ride the bike to the bike shop ..

and see what they have, and can get. .. if not in stock at that moment.

Trick!

Agreed,well done.

Lieren:never had an issue mounting fenders on my disc bikes. Just get longer bolts(they're M5's) with some spacers and bend the stays a little if needed. PB actually includes long bolts with fancy aluminum spacers with their 29er Cascadia fenders.

+1. Did the exact same thing on my ride with the Surly Troll fork. Planet Bike Cascadias, can't say enough good about these. Love them.

I run SKS ones. The CX model. I shortened the front bracket and attached them up the fork where the front rack attaches, instead of trying to bend them around the brakes. On a Salsa Vaya 3. Only complaint is that the front fender bounced on the tire at the front on rough pavement.

Ah, I get it now! Thanks for the pix. And ccorlew, that is one nice lookin' bike.

I forgot to mention my tires are 32 which means of the brands recommended I think I need the SKS Longboard P45 or the PB Hardcore Hybrid?

One other random question for the collective wisdom: if you have a plastic front fender, and put your bike on a bus bike rack, will the clamping mechanism that holds your bike in place damage the plastic? (With my last set of fenders, one of them snapped just from road vibration and plastic fatigue.)

Reviving a thread here.. Any ideas on how to achieve such a nice bend without a vice?

Two short (6"-8") sections of 2"X4" would do it. Put the fender stay between the two blocks of wood to hold the stay and control the bend (over an edge). One could either kneel/stand on the blocks to keep them together, or tie them together with twine or other cordage.

Just about anything will do that will hold the stay relatively straight, and create an edge to bend over. One could also use a pair of linesman's pliers or channel locks, but this will leave tooling marks.

I've got one of these:
Wire Bender - Lee Valley Tools

Used to have it mounted to the base of my old Soloflex before I sold it.