I’ve written here about my appreciation for the fenders I have on my Catrike Expedition. After two years of intermittently getting water, mud, and snow, flung up at me while riding my Pocket, they were a pleasant relief.
What I did not realize or anticipate was that I was also getting a little bit of bonus shelving with those fenders as well.
Because of where they mount at the base of the handlebars, the struts for the fenders actually offer a bit of rare semi-horizontal surface on the trike. I say "semi" horizontal, because they actually sit at a bit of an angle. And, if we are being honest, it’s really a semi surface too, since it’s an open triangle with two small flat bars about a quarter-inch wide. So seeing it as a semi-horizontal surface may take a bit of imagination.
Or - more accurately, it takes a bit of help.
Early on it occurred to me to use this area when I was looking for a means to mount a battery pack on the trike - here I’m referring to the small batteries for charging mobile devices. These are wonderful for extending phone life while on longer rides, and can be used to charge USB lights in a pinch as well. On the Pocket I had been carrying the battery in the Arkel bags, and had used a USB extension cable routed though the seat and strapped to the frame. This worked ok, but was prone to bouts of suddenly not charging, which necessitated trouble shooting through multiple connection points - a thing you don’t really want to stop in the middle of your ride (and it always happened in the middle of a ride) to do. But the Pocket, being on the smaller side by design, didn’t offer a lot of other options for location, so I struggled through with it.
When the Expedition arrived, it wasn’t long before I began eyeballing that space on the fender struts for the battery. It sits right beneath the phone mount (I use a Rokform motorcycle mount, which works with a Rokform case), so it would offer a much shorter - and much less complicated - connection to the phone. It would also be closer to the front light on the boom mount, which is the light I’m most likely to need to plug in on a longer ride, allowing me to get there with a single, longer cable, removing the need for an extension cord.
The question was how to get a battery pack - or anything really - attached to the fender strut. I puzzled over this for a bit and played with a couple of unsuccessful options. And then I realized what I needed was a space-age material - something that astronauts would use - to solve this problem.
Yup - I needed Velcro. Or, I suppose I should say "hook and loop fastener material"...
I’m making like this was a great revelation, but the reality is that I use Velcro for a lot of things. Adhesive Velcro can be purchased in big rolls, and you can cut pieces to size and purpose. It’s pretty handy stuff.
What I did, then, was to line the strut arms with the soft side of the Velcro, cut specifically to the shape of the arms. You can do this by simply tracing around the arms on the back of the velcro (easier to see if you use a white marker) and then cutting it with scissors. I think the end result looks pretty good - because the Velcro and the fenders are both black, it’s almost unnoticeable when there’s nothing on it, and I’ve had it there for about a year, and it’s still in good condition.
On the battery pack I just place a nice, large piece of the hard side across the back.
There may be a temptation to put small pieces on in order to line up with the struts, but this is additional effort without much benefit. While you will use less material, it’s much easier to get the battery seated if you don’t have to be super-precise in how it is situated. Once it’s on there you can just stick it on the fender:
The little shorty Lightening cable is a find from Amazon, and it’s perfect for this sort of application.
While I set up the battery pack this way early in the game, I have since adapted it to add some additional items. As I’ve increased my riding over the season, I’ve also been experiencing some increased engagement with citizens of the canine variety (more on that another time, most likely). Given this, I’ve found it helpful to have some deterrents close at hand. For these I mounted additional strips of Velcro across the top strut and the vertical portion of the fender beside the wheel:
And then just put strips across the deterrent items:
The air horn is wedged in pretty solidly, but I find that it doesn’t usually have to be pointed straight at the offender to be effective. I put smaller strips on the pepper spray because it’s lighter, and I wanted to be able to pull it off quickly and easily at times of deployment. It works pretty well.
And I still have an open "shelf" on the left fender if I need it. So far I haven’t had anything to put there, but I could imagine specifically setting up a second battery pack there - maybe a dedicated one to power the headlight for longer rides.
Ok - now that everything is set up, it’s time to ride!