Mirrors

I can't stand to ride without a rear view mirror and for the past 20 years or so I've been using a Rhode Gear mirror that hooks over the brake lever hood.

It's been a great mirror, but the reflection is starting to get a little milky looking with age and I wanted to have a mirror for both bikes. I couldn't find any place that sold the Rhode Gear mirror like mine.

So, I bought a Blackburn mirror that hooks over the brake hood with velcro, just like the old Rhode Gear one, but the arm is light plastic and has a lot of vibration, and the tightening mechanism to hold it in adjustment is too weak for the weight of the mirror head.

It looks much nicer than my old one, but since it won't hold it's adjustment for more than 10 seconds it's pretty much worthless.

Does anyone have any experience with other handlebar mounted mirrors?

I've seen some on-line that hook into the end of the drop bar and while that sounds like it would be very stable, I wonder if that much of an angle would really provide a good view behind.

At the risk of looking like more of a dork, I have been thinking about getting a mirror that mounts on my helmet. I have five road bikes and the thought of buying a mirror for every one of them scares my wallet to death.

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The new bar-end mirror guys are using here is kidney-shaped and convex. Judging by comments I've heard, it does work well.

After using the old Rhode Gear mirror on-and-off, I switched to a Cycle Aware helmet mirror years ago. It's on a swivel mount pad that sticks on the helmet, so the mirror can swing down, or pop off easily when not needed. The helmet-mount provides a view that you can instantly adjust by moving your head, and vibration issues are minimal vs bar-ends. Only downside is that you have the mirror blocking part of the vision from your left eye, but if the mirror is correctly adjusted "up and away", you're not losing any view of the road.