Cork Spacers for Fender Mounting

By Scott

Pro-tip: display stained-side out where possible

Cork is a very versatile material. In addition to its application as a forgiving flooring, coffee shop message board, and drink coasters, we also use it in our Cork Grips. It provides a natural feel and wears into the hand position of the rider. More recently, we've used it on our upcoming Neutrino mini-velo to take up space between the fenders and mounting points.

Now, if you're someone who perhaps doesn't drink wine, or your wine comes with a plastic screw top, don't despair. Many wine shops have bowls of corks about for free or you could ask around your neighbors for a couple. Some of the fancy Belgian beer bottles are using corks now, too, rather than flip-tops.

So on to the nitty gritty of cork spacers.  Most of it falls back to the idea of measure twice, cut once. You can cut cork with a variety it devices - an X-Acto knife works great for most folks, Igor uses a small saw to cut down ones for his builds. Just remember to be careful and keep the fingers away from the sharp blade.

After you've cut the spacer to the desired thickness, take the appropriate size drill bit and drill a hole for the bolt to go through.  You can get all precise, drawing a line through each axis on the cork to get the exact centre, or you can just eyeball it and it should be close enough for non-concours work.

Igor suggests using wide spacers where you can such as between the cork and a braze-on lest you crack the spacer by creating a stress riser. The cork should rest upon the fender specifically to compress and match the curvature of the fender. The good thing is that they are super easy to make, so if you need another spacer, you can probably use the leftovers from the cork you've already cut up.

Notice cork spacers under the fork crown as well as between the rack and fender (all made from the same cork)

Now line up the fender, the cork spacer and the bolt and thread away!