With the fall upon us, winter approaching and the bay area getting its first rain of the season, we decided to put the fenders on the tandem. In reality, we had them on in Italy anticipating that there may be a couple of days of rain. Yesterday, it rained cats and dogs but today was beautiful and we went on a 40 mile ride with fenders on. There was some dampness on the roads but pretty dry.

Yes, they are a little Fred but effective in keeping the road water off the bike and team.

Us waiting to board the ferry in Elba with bike and fenders...we lugged them all over Italy to assure nice weather for all.

Living primarily in the desert Southwest, we do not use fenders/mudguards.
Having a trunkbag on rear rack does help the stoker in the rare case it does rain and avoids the rooster- tail marks on clothing. Pilot just puts with it.
Have been caught in few heavy downpours on tours. Once coming from Grand Canyon's South Rim to Flagstaff it rained buckets. About 60 miles at 7,000 ft. elevation and no place to hide anywhere! Did put on our rain jackets and pedaled on. Worst was vehicles spraying us with sheets of water as they blasted past at 60 mph. Fenders would not have made one iota of difference. We actually laughed about it and threatened to drill holes in bottom of our shoes just to let water out!
Deluge finally let up as we neared Flagstaff; stopped at a pancake house in town to grab a bite. Waitress took pity on us and told us to put tandem in the lobby! Then brought us hot cofee and free pie!
Have also been caught, in the desert, in a horrendous hail storm. Again we were on a tour and saw a huge blackness in front of us. Stopped, and by the time we got out our rain jacket we got pelted by big hailstones. Stoker Kay was dancing around hollering "ouch, ouch!" as she put on her jacket. Temp dropped about 20 degrees, instantly so kept on the jackets.
After we hit our destination she found out her arms/legs had black and blue marks from the hail. All this stuff about 'it's a dry heat' in the desert is true, but not 100% of the time!
Did have half-fenders way back in 1975 on our Follis tandem, but then we lived inMichigan where rain was more likely.
We have so much sunshine out here that if it rains, we don't go riding. There's always 'manana'!
Pedal on TWOgether!
Rudy and Kay/zonatandem

Road tandem with SKS Racer blades does the trick when mother nature doesn't cooperate. No where near as good as having full-coverage mud guards, but better than nothing... at least if you're riding alone. Of course, being the only one with mud guards on a group ride only works if you're willing to pull the entire time. On the up side, we find that just having them in the truck seems to keep the rain away (Murphy's Law, don't you know).



Off-road tandem with quick-release SKS something-or-others. The front guard is exceptional, the rear adequate but can be more trouble than it's worth once it starts to collect mud and gain weight. Also, the attitude of the rear mud guard changes from 9 O'Clock to about 11 O'Clock once you bottom out the rear shock and drive it into the rear tire and looks really weird... kinda like a bird's tail sticking up while they grunt one out.

Fraidycats! How low can ya go???