I was fixing up bikes for my friend and his daughter yesterday. My friend rides his bike every day as his main transport, and the mud flaps have fallen off his fenders. I cut up a white plastic orange juice jug and made a long, wide mudflap for his front fender. Tested it by riding through some deep puddles, worked pretty well. He cares not at all about how his bike looks - for the annual fix-up last year I bought the period correct, color matched "UNIVEGA" downtube decal to replace the scarred one, and he told me he didn't see any reason to bother installing it - so I wasn't worried about the ghetto mod.

Now, let's turn to my commute bike. I do care how it looks, to a point - not enough to wash it too often, but enough that I've matched bar tape and water bottles to the primary decal color (orange). It, too, has lost one of its mudflaps. And I have just drained a white plastic gallon jug of milk . . .

My question is how awful it will look. This is my commute bike (below). Imagine it with wide, glaring white plastic milk jug mud flaps hanging nearly to the pavement. More "not" than "hot"?

What alternative material would you recommend to me - preferred: cheap-to-free, easily found, light, and functional.

Heck, let's show our home-made mud flaps and share design tips and fitment tricks!

I use a strip of rubber roofing material, cut the same width as the fender at the top, to about 3" wide at the bottom - your choice of length. Pop riveted to the fender or existing factory mud flap. Stiff enough to be functional, flexible enough to not be a bother in the wind.

Just tossing out ideas, I don't really live in fender country.

If you are looking for already-black flexible plastic the first thing that springs to my mind is motor oil bottles.

If you can find an appropriate shaped thing made out of Lexan, or even just a sheet, then you can use R/C car body paint and that opens up a world of airbrush tricks etc. It's tough, too.

I cut up a plastic report cover and rivet it to the fender.

My mudflap has me seeing stars when I look at it. From a 5qt Kemps ice cream pail. I could have chosen an ice cream cone theme as well. Field tested this week in -23 F temps.

Hmm. This homemade flap stuff is more subtle than I realized. My milk jug flap doesn't look terrible, IMO, and has that seemingly-cool (but maybe not really) tight fit to the tire, but it also vibrates such that bumps have it jittering against the tire tread. Back to the drawing board.

I made my mudflaps from... mudflaps. Used a (found) thin car mudflap, cut to shape, attached it with 2 4mm bolts.

That's a wear-in custom fit.

No........that makes way too much sense.

Yard edging. The black plastic kind that comes in a roll. It's thin enough to cut easily. You have to cut the top edge off, then its easy to cut to any shape you want. I used a piece to go from the rear rack down to the chainstays. Worked pretty well. Black plastic matched other blak bits on the bike.

I use heavy-duty rubber tool box shelf liner. I cut about a 3-4" strip 2/3rds the inside width of the fender,then flair it out on either side to about 1/2" wider than the fender and make it as long as it needs to be to protect the front rings. Put heavy-duty 3M double-sided tape on the thin strip and just stick it up in the fender. Looks clean,lasts for years.

Mine is doing that as well. I'm going to try a little persuasion with a hair dryer or heat gun. But I really do like the way it follows the curve of the wheel. I vote cool.

The vestigial mudflaps on my Serfas fenders weren't doing the job, so I cut up a quart-size milk jug and used a curtain-hook-thingy to fasten it. The proof of the pudding, etc etc:



My crank and downtube (not to mention my feet) are much cleaner now.

On closer observation, my flap is vibrating due to wind, oscillating from right to left - I drilled a few holes in the lower corners to reduce the air pressure and we'll see if that helps. If not - need to drink another gallon of milk.

Leather. If you can get ahold of a wide strip that works. Maybe some old dress shoes. Otherwise cut a belt (wider is better) into strips, pop rivet them to the milk jug flap, and trim to shape.

This. Generic leather tool belt from WalMart or Home Depot is around 5 dollars. The western-style tooling goes away after it gets wet a few times and you just have a nice, heavy leather flap. Held in place with M4 bolts.

I had a vintage German bike where the leather front mudflap was attached via two hooks around the sides of the fender. It could slide up the fender, then would fall back down until it caught on the fender stay. So if you rolled the bike off a curb, rather than smashing your flap it would just slide up, then fall back down. Simple and brilliant.

Edit: I recall it was a Puch. Too small for me, I gave it to my neice.

I did this following a link from a previous thread here:

https://www.phred.org/~alex/bikes/fendermudflap.html

Rubber stair tread, cut to the shape you want. I made my front one a bit wider than I sometimes see. Great in slush and snow.

I use the curved side of a Tide detergent jug, since it will sort of continue the curvature of the fender.

I use heavy leather, cut to fit inside the fender for about two inches, and pop riveted to the fender. The flap than extends down to about 3/4 of an inch from ground and flails out to 4 1/2 inches. Excellent coverage, keeps me clean and dry.

As a side note, my mudflaps are flat, and I noticed some water splashing from the sides. I'll try adding a strip of aluminum to curve them, so water is deflected more.