Recommendations - Bike carrier

whippet

I'm looking for some recommendations for a reasonably priced but decent (€300-400) bike carrier for 4 bikes (2 adult and 2 kids) .. tow bar mounted

Most of what I can find are for 3 bike

loyatemu

I have this one - took 4 effectively adult-sized bikes to the Vendee on it in July.

2 caveats:

• You can't open the boot once the bikes are on (though you can open it with the rack on on it's own).
• On my car there was quite a bit of "bounce" as you go over bumps which I found a bit disconcerting so I bought a couple of straps in Decathlon and secured it to the boot lid for the journey back to reduce the movement. However many of the reviews on the Halfords website describe it as "rock solid" so it may just be my towbar.

cdaly_

Any rack extends the rear overhang of your car. If you have something with a long boot and add a 4-bike rack, that hugely increases the extra leverage on the car.

An alternative option is to use a combination of rear rack and roof rack. That was my method in my drive a hedgehog to France days...

Lemming

Maybe take a look at the larger Thule tow-bar racks. I use an Easy-fold 2-bike carrier and it's awesome. Can even access the boot with bikes attached. But as others have said, mgiht want to consider a mix of tow-bar & roof rack. All depends on what you're planning on hauling and how big your car is already. A couple of adult size bikes and kids bikes wouldn't be much of a sweat, but four full-suspension mountain bikes would give me cause to stand back and consider my options.


Whatever you opt for, a tip: keep a couple of old inner tubes handy to secure your frames on top of whatever your chosen carrier provides. Speed bumps tend to make bikes move about in the most unexpected of ways ...