Am thinking of purchasing a road bike for riding through the winter. For practicality I think I should fit mudguards.
What are your recomendations/experiences????
Ta
A
New I'd look at a Planet-X kaffenback and SKS chromoplastics
2nd hand I'd look for something like a dawes galaxy, although IMO its a fugly bike so I'd look even older at somethign steel and lugged.
Anything that takes Crud race guards. Been using them on my zero clearance fixie for the last year and they work really well. Don't need mudguard eyes or anything like that.
id second the equilibrium...one came in the other day and it looked really good.
we do a special build called the inverno with full 105/carbon fork/deda finishing kit/alloy frame made by dolan...good value at a grand
or weve sold 3 kinesis bikes so far all under £1k they looked really smart..
then you get into all the cross bikes that you can easily convert...
cotic roadrat is pretty cool..the list is exhaustive!
This seems to get good reviews:
http://www.wiggle.co.uk/p/cycle/7/Verenti_Kilmeston/5360048366/
I've got a Kinesis Racelight T, quite racey though, but great if you want to mimic the position of your road (race) bike.
On an impulse I bought a Trek Portland just after Christmas last year to stop me from ruining my 853 featch mudguard bike.
The Portland has been OK with nice big mudguards and a solid rack.
On a slightly less biased note what kind of money are you thinking? There are loads of options out there and as JonEdwards says you could stick Crud racer guards on pretty much any road bike.
Nice old secondhand bike like a Holdsworth off of ebay, just throwing the old retro option in.
Kinesis Racelight Tk - fantastic ride, even with mudguards on. I'm always surprised how good it is when I ride it - can't say that for many bikes!
http://www.roadcyclinguk.com/gear-news/tifosi-ck7-classic/4612.html
far better than a Kaffenback
plenty of deals around
If I didn't already have a suitable bike I would be looking at the new Ragley.
2nd GZA's recommendation of a Racelight Tk. I use mine for everything from commuting to sportives. Its a race bike but takes full guards and also has rack fittings. As GZA said it rides really well- better than a Scott Addict and Bianchi Infinito I recently tested.
Loads of options around but I would put the kinesis at the top of my list.Good quality frame with a nice finish.
A word of warning, and speaking from experience a MTB is better than a road bike (with or without mudguards)in five inches of snow.
On an even more useful nots the Crud Catcher Road 'guards don't need any braze-ons


