Bike Rack Suggestions

[amy5708]

we have 4 bikes, and currently use a hitch-mounted bike rack for the car (toad). The thing is a total pain to use. So much that we end up leaving our bikes at home.

Your hands get all banged up, and getting all the bikes on is tough because they are all scrunched together and scratch the paint on the bike.

Thinking of a roof-mounted rack or one where the tires sit on.

Any suggestions.

[amy5708]

we have 4 bikes, and currently use a hitch-mounted bike rack for the car (toad). The thing is a total pain to use. So much that we end up leaving our bikes at home.

Your hands get all banged up, and getting all the bikes on is tough because they are all scrunched together and scratch the paint on the bike.

Thinking of a roof-mounted rack or one where the tires sit on.

Any suggestions.

[AFChap]

We used to have a hitch-mounted rack with wheel trays that worked great. It came in a two-bike configuration, and had a two-bike extension that I also bought. The bikes mounted on front fork locks with a strap from the rail around the bottom of the rear tire. It was an Xport Horizon from Performance Bike (www.performancebike.com). I have no idea if they still sell that one.

I had several racks over the years, and that one was great. Many roof racks also use a wheel rail system, but I couldn't see me getting the bikes up and down from the roof. There are some now that the rail swings down on the ground for you to mount the bike ...don't know how "easy" they are to then swing the bike up and down.

I regretfully sold the rack when we started fulltiming and didn't want my exotic bikes exposed to the weather all the time. I sold all but one, and carry it inside our Honda Oddysey.

[tps0424]

We have a 4 bike, tray style carrier that's much easier to use than the one with the two rods coming out. It's made by Swagman. Model is XC4. Try www.swagmanbikeracks.com

[Y-Guy]

The Yakima rack KingCobra or Raptor are a good way to go, depending on your vehicle. I won't say these are all that much easier then a hitch rack though. What hitch rack do you have now?

[amy5708]

Thanks for the feedback.

We have a Yakima now.

tps0424, I couldn't open your link.

I did find this rack. Looks very cool, but expensive (will be $600 for the main rack plus extension).
http://www.rei.com/product/737249

Has anyone had experience with this?

Thanks, amy

[tps0424]

Sorry Amy. I just fixed it. you should be able to access it now.

[george henry]

We bought ours at REI

[amy5708]

tps0424,

The Swagman looks just like the other one, but is less than half the price!

My big question is how much does it bounce up and down when driving. If we take this puppy up to Alaska with us next year on the back of the Jeep, with all four bikes on it, is it going to be all over the place?

We have to occasionally tighten the bolts on our Yakima now because of the movement.

[tps0424]

Amy... We only used ours once but, it was from Rhode Island to Myrtle Beach, SC. We had a ll 4 bikes on the rack and the rack was on our 31' Itasca Class C. When I checked on them using the rear view camera, they never moved even going over some pretty touch road in Connecticut! As you know, with the overhang on a 31' class C, there is plenty of up and down back there to get the rack moving but, it stayed very solid.
It should have no problem on a Jeep.

Tim