Quite happy with this, home made Fatty rear carbon mudgaurd.

I posted this on the Fat Bike forum, but I guess this could be used for other bike wheel sizes and also, other people not signed up to the Fat Bike forum might want to see this.

This turned out quite well and was reasonably easy to do, so I thought I’d share in case anyone else fancied giving it a try themselves.

I used 1mtr of 600g 3K 2/2 twill carbon x 5 inches, I put it down on some clear (cling film type) wrapping tape and wetted it with resin, then put another layer of film on top and trimmed of the edges.
Then I put it inside one of my fat tyres and then inflated an inner tube inside it to give it the shape.
Next day I took the inner tube out and then took my new carbon mudguard out 🙂
The inside of the mudguard was very smooth and looked good due to the inner tube being smooth, the outside was a bit bumpy due to the inside of the tyre being the mould, but it was good enough for what I was after and the only thing left to do was to trim the edges to make them smoother.
I could’ve spent another couple of hours sanding the outside and making it look a bit better, but its a mudguard for my do everything Fatty bike, so its there to do a job, not for looks, maybe on the next one though.
I needed a rack for the Fatty anyway, and it turned out great because I used that as the fixing points for the mudguard.

It was a bit close to the tyre in some places, so I cut the edges a bit to help lift it away from the tyre and that seemed to do the job.
I just hope that the zip ties holding it up never fail, as the tyre will rip it to shreds!

I am now going to do another one for the front as my duct taped one I am using just now is a bit ugly!

No spoons?

Yeah. Disappointing absence of spoons.

Maybe you could try a fork to, you know, widen the pool knowledge on carbon manufacturing techniques?

Nice work sir.

Loving the use of the inner tube for consolidation.

Wont they clog up ,you have little mud clearance ?

Perhaps an inner tube for the outer layer instead of clingfilm?

Had precisely the same idea earlier this year but was thinking of using a 29er or C tyre to produce road guards. Never got round to it and just bought a pair of guards in the end…

Kudos Op, nice work.

Looks cool but as above, there’s not much clearance? I bought a mucky nutz front fat fender for the front and shaped a rear mud hugger I had kicking around and stuck an extension on. Works a treat with plenty of clearance. Also stuck a fat gut fender on too for added mud free-ness…

Looks fantastic! Where did you source your bits from?
Would like to make something similar for my Stooge.

Well, its been a few days and I have now just finished the front.

cokie, just Googling “carbon kits” brings up a few results for the different places you can buy stuff.
I bought most of my stuff from easycomposites, they have another website with a different name, not sure why.

The kits are pretty cheap and usually have enough carbon to get you going with smallish projects, but if you did need more carbon, it doesn’t really cost much at all.
I found getting a square mtr of 600g carbon was only a few pounds more than 200g!

I took a few more pictures of the making of the front:
This is the main meter long x5″-7″ piece with a few extra pieces for added strength because there wont be as many fixing points as I had on the back~

All pieces together, wetted (with resin) and wrapped in film ready to go in the mould/tyre~

The next day, out of the mould and trimmed (poorly!), its on the bike~

I used a thicker plastic builders bag as the film that goes between the carbon and the tyre this time, but it didn’t work in smoothing out the finish, it actually made it a bit worse!
You can see on the edges where the thick’ish bag and carbon couldn’t compress enough against the tyre and have left small ridges/lines.
I was just thinking (a bit late for that!) that if I put the tyre on the wheel and inflated it there, then I am pretty sure the extra pressure I could get that way, would have made a better outer finish, the inside looks great and almost professional!
I made the arms for the fork attachment quite thick, because they aren’t allowed to move much when in position.
One thing I have found while doing these, is that using a heat gun will soften the carbon (once its set) and make it reasonably mould-able, unfortunately, the arms were just a bit too thick for that and I couldn’t get them to wrap around the fork neatly, so I will make a slightly thinner piece and use that to mould around the fork and attach that to the thicker piece to make it look a bit nicer.

I know there are people on this forum vastly more experienced than me when it comes to carbon stuff, but if you want any help or need tips, just ask away 🙂

Oh, tyre clearance.
There doesn’t look much, but I have been out in the deeeep snow and sploshed through lots of mud and I have had no problems….yet.
Im sure the lack of tread on the Floater helps because not much sticks to it.

Get some peelply for a cool mattish finish.
Or make one that the right shape, spend time getting the outside snooth and then make a mould from it.
Nice work and a cool idea.