First and foremost, the new Crankbrothers Guardian - just like all other handguards - is designed to protect your hands on overgrown and narrow trails. The speciality: Crankbrothers rely on particularly simple and stylish mounting. Depending on the version, the handguards can be attached to the inner clamp of most lock-on grips using an adapter. Without additional clamps, this integrated solution keeps the cockpit tidy. For those who don't ride screw-on grips or have grips with an incompatible clamp, the Guardians are also available with a conventional clamp directly on the handlebars.
Crankbrothers Guardian: Fact check
- Lateral adjustability of the shield: 33 millimetres
- Weight: 177 grams (without spacers)
- Mounting: Clamping directly on the handlebars / clamping on the inner clamp of screw grips
- Compatibility: DMR, One Up Components, Diety, PNW, Wolf Tooth, Race Face, WTB, Peaty, ODI, Lizard Skins, Sensus, Ergon GA, Ergon GFR1, Ergon GD1, Ergon GE, SQ Lab
- Warranty: 5 years
- Price (RRP) integrated version: 59.99 euros
- Price (RRP) normal clamping: 49.99 euros
Construction and material
The Guardian handguards consist of two main components: The arm is made of glass fibre reinforced nylon, while the protective shield is made of HIPP (High Impact Polypropylene). This combination of materials is intended to ensure an optimum balance between stability on the arm and flexibility on the protective shield. The use of HIPP for the shield is designed to give way instead of breaking on contact with obstacles.
Adjustability and assembly
The Guardian handguards offer infinite lateral adjustability of 33 millimetres. This means that the protective shields can be optimally aligned to the handlebar ends, even in combination with particularly wide or narrow grips. Another good feature is that you can choose between two different height positions when attaching them to the arm. This means that the Guardians can be easily adapted to all conceivable brake lever configurations.
Compatibility and adaptability
Crankbrothers obviously attaches particular importance to the compatibility of the Guardian handguards with different grip systems. The scope of delivery therefore includes a pair of clamping rings and three pairs of adapters. This allows the Guardians to be integrated into most common screw grips.
Test impression by Max Fuchs, BIKE test editor
For the test, I fitted the integrated version of the Guardian handguards to a pair of my favourite grips (ODI Elite Pro Lock-On V2). Installation is child's play: remove the original clamping ring on the grip, fit the Crankbrothers clamping ring and tighten. Once the grip is back in place, all you have to do is place the clamp of the handguard arm around the new clamping ring - done! From here you can adjust the tilt of the Guardians with ease. Thanks to the infinitely variable lateral adjustment of the shields, aligning them with the handlebar ends is also a piece of cake. In short, the new Crankbrothers really impressed me in terms of handling. So far, so good. In everyday trail riding, there are only two evaluation criteria for handguards: Protection and durability. The Guardians do the former well. The large shields reliably protect the hands from blows from undergrowth or branches that protrude onto the trail. The durability, on the other hand, was not very convincing. A single fall - at walking speed, mind you - was enough to break the clamp on the glass fibre-reinforced nylon arm. What a pity! So my tip: go for models with flexible plastic shields paired with more stable aluminium arms. This combination has proven to be the best in past tests.
Max Fuchs
Editor
