Bike rack for five bikes ?

Pez

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Hi. With three young children, we have a hard-working motorhome. We all mountainbike regularly, but as they and their bikes grow, getting the bikes on board is becoming increasingly difficult. We have a rear mounted Fiamma Carrybike for four bikes, and I squeeze one of the 20" wheeled bikes in the garage. When the 20" bikes turns into a 24" wheeled bike, fitting it in the garage plus all the other clobber on a big trip is not going to be an option. I have been looking for a rack that we can mount to the rear of the van, which carries five full size bikes. I attach an image of the rear of the van, and the working area is approx 1.5m wide and 1.6m tall. Does anyone have any suggestions ?IMG_3768.JPG
 
Before getting too carried away with hanging 5 full size bikes on rear , considering your garage is full , have you weighed the rear axle ? :) especially with 3 growing children and two adults on board .
 
Think you might be needing to think on a trailer (box) type and fit cycle carrier to top of that
 
We once went on a trip round France with eight people and eight bikes: four in the bike rack, four on the roof.
Not specially convenient, having to load and unload, but more than four bikes would be too heavy to hang that far back, and would be too much for the rack and probably too much for the back wall.
 
I would first check to see what the weight limit for the bike rack is. From memory it is 60kg and I suspect five bikes would exceed this. Perhaps look if the bike weights can be reduced by removing the front wheels (with adaptions to the rack) and saddles to get within the weight limit of the rack. Sorry, that's probably not very helpful but maybe something that would jog others to have better ideas.
 
RV2MAX said:
Before getting too carried away with hanging 5 full size bikes on rear , considering your garage is full , have you weighed the rear axle ? :) especially with 3 growing children and two adults on board .
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Unless you have a 4500kg rated van the first thing you need to do is get it weighed. Remember the weight includes everything people, dogs the lot.

My view after getting my van weighed was that any 3500kg m/h carrying 2 bikes will be overweight. I even had to junk my cycle rack. You might be better either with a trailer or taking off wheels and putting in the garage, and or getting your van uprated.
 
in h said:
We once went on a trip round France with eight people and eight bikes: four in the bike rack, four on the roof.
Not specially convenient, having to load and unload, but more than four bikes would be too heavy to hang that far back, and would be too much for the rack and probably too much for the back wall.
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I saw a YouTube video a while back. An SUV with a roof mounted bike rack, with bikes, going under a height barrier. Not pretty, but very entertaining.🤑
 
The laird said:
Think you might be needing to think on a trailer (box) type and fit cycle carrier to top of that
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It would need to be a fairly wide, low, stable trailer, or the weight of bikes on the top might make it top-heavy and unsteady.
 
Trotter said:
I saw a YouTube video a while back. An SUV with a roof mounted bike rack, with bikes, going under a height barrier. Not pretty, but very entertaining.🤑
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These were laid flat on the roof, so not much higher than the bits that stuck up on top. We went on the jetfoil thing across the channel, I remember. It just fitted under, but there was no turning space. It was easy to reverse out, though.
 
Thanks for all the responses. Much appreciated food for thought. The MH has a 4000kg rating, but you have aired some of my deeper concerns. i.e. the tension load on the rear wall panel. Although, with the bikes mounted vertically (and more especially with the front wheels removed), the cantilever effect would be far reduced over the current 4-bike Fiamma. Helpfully, that states a max load of both 50kg and 60kgs ! I don't own a bike over 12kgs. So, let's say I afford the kids the same luxury, that's a net weight of 60kgs max. It still feels doable; perhaps with five Thule ProRide 598's, either directly mounted, or (more likely) attached to a pair of roof bars fixed across the rear panel. Pricey though !
 
The snag is that lightweight bikes are an expensive thing to leave exposed to the swirling dirt behind a motorhome and the swirling thieves they could attract.
At least on the roof they're out of the dirt and out of reach of opportunist thieves.
 
If you are under the specified weight look at mounting the cycles vertically. One cross member for wheel to rest on (or two and rest between) then fix a brace across the carrier higher if necessary to clamp the frames to.668EFB21-6344-4CFF-9951-D25B5D257770.jpeg
 
So, after casting the opinion net, the consensus appears to be - anything over four bikes and I need to be considering a chassis based system. One person describes seeing an MH "peeled open like a tin can as a result of the loading on the rear wall being too great". I'd like to avoid that scenario ! I thought Thule ProRides and Roofbars would be pricey, until I saw the prices of chassis mounted carriers from Al-Ko / Sawiko. I think I'm going to have to solve two problems at once......by selling a child !
 
Can you get one (or two) of the kids bikes inside for travelling? It depends what storage you have in the van but removing wheels will lessen the load on the rack, (mine is 60Kg max).
 
nabsim said:
Can you get one (or two) of the kids bikes inside for travelling? It depends what storage you have in the van but removing wheels will lessen the load on the rack, (mine is 60Kg max).
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Thanks. A good idea. And this would generally work, unless we are wildcamping/aires. I am looking at systems where the front wheels are removed. But, even then, five full size wheels take up a lot of space.
 
I notice you have a ladder on the back, is there any space up there?
 
Think you need to check the available weight allowed on a bike rack attached to the rear of your van. If you overload a bike rack you could literally tear the back panel out of your van or at least damage where the rack fits.
 
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