It's cheap and easy to make them yourself.

You need fenders for your mountain bike. A rear fender saves your suspension from getting blasted with mud and water. A front fender keeps mud and dog poop from flying in your face.

There's really not much to mountain bike fenders - they're just flat pieces of cut out plastic with some holes punched in them for mounting. So why do they cost so freakin' much? They don't have to.

Skip the blah, blah, blah and take me to the... Instructions

I'm calling my rear fender a “suspension saver”. It's designed to keep water and mud out of your rear linkage, shock and drivetrain.

My front fender is what most folks call a “mud guard”. I'm not trying to create the best mud guard here - I'd be competing with a gajillion other designs. But I am trying to create the best free, do-it-yourself mud guard template.

The idea for this project came to me while I was rebuilding the rear shock on my mountain bike. Water had gotten inside of the seals after a particularly wet PNW ride. It was clear to me that I needed some protection from the wet, muddy trails I was riding. Being cheap and somewhat handy, I decided to make my own fenders. I couldn't find a good template online (especially for a rear fender), so I created my own. Getting the shape of the fenders and the mounting holes right was harder than I thought. I figured I'd save you the same headache and share my templates, as well as instructions on how to use them.

Don't pay $10+ for a flat piece of plastic. You can make your own mountain bike fenders.