Move over, Rain Tail—there's a new ultraminimal rear fender in town. The Plume is a recoiling mudguard that is deployed by unrolling the coiled strip of stainless steel and 'retracted' with a simple flick. The hardware slides neatly onto a bicycle seatpost and it looks something like a sideways cupholder when not in use, functioning something like a reverse slap-bracelet.
Founders Dan McMahon and Patrick Laing met three years ago in London and have been developing the Plume for about as long. Now that they've filed a patent on the recoiling design, they're pleased to present their creation to the public via Kickstarter.
It's certainly a clever solution to a common problem, and the Kickstarter page duly features a couple examples of what Sparse deemed to be "bike hacks," i.e. variations on DIY mudguards. The main advantage of these ad hoc fabrications is that they're inherently disposable; the tradeoff is that they're ugly as sin.
The Plume is a far more elegant way to stay dry, at least as a light-duty solution: I've found that seatpost- or saddle-mounted (in the case of the Rain Tail) mudguards are useful for moderately inclement weather conditions; for anything more than a steady drizzle, not so much. Thus, the Plume is best suited for those who care about preserving the clean lines of our beloved machines; those who'd rather preserve their own bodies are and always will be better off with full fenders.
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