Bicycle Rack

[Dan_5040593]

is it safe to put a bicycle rack on the back of my

of my swift caravan.I am concerned about the weight

of at least two bicycles on the van.Or is it safer

to put a carrier on top of my car.The bicycle carrier

will be a Fiamma carrier.

 

[Damian]

Dan, depends on whether your van has the necessary reinforcing in the right place to accept a rack, best check with your dealer or Swift direct.

Personally I would not put cycles on the backof the van, as it will change the weight distribution, with weight just where you dont want it,furthest away from the axle.

 

[Lutz]

Bicycle racks on the back of the caravan are just about the worst place to have them. Quite apart from the fact that they will make it more difficult to achieve proper (i.e. adequate) noseweight, the weight of the bikes so far behind the axle increases the polar moment of inertia of the caravan. This can be significantly detrimental to the stability of the outfit.

 

[RichardS1]

Without a doubt the best place to carry bicycles without potentially impacting on the stability of the outfit is on the roof of the car.

 

[rob_jax]

Agree with Lutz, Damian and Richard about de-stabilising the caravan.

But there is one further advantage to placing a roof rack on the car: If you have the rack on the caravan, you are limited to cycling from where the van is parked. If you have the rack on the car roof, you can drive somewhere else and then cycle.

Robert

 

[PC_5119929]

Bikes on back of caravan are not to clever an idea.

I borrowed two top quality cycle roof racks in the past. One with the wheels in the air that drummed as the wheels turned and the other with the bikes upright. We could hear drumming noises and in high winds the bikes and all the bars became a good air brake.

In high winds from Dover to Holland the side winds on the high mounted bikes had and adverse effect on the cars handling and performance, on the return journey I broke the bikes down and fited the wheels in the car and frames in the van and in stronger winds we had a pleasant return journey.

Roof mounting with two different styles of rack I've found to effect the cars stability when the wind gets up.

 

[vi]

Has anyone towed with cycles on a rack on the A frame? Our dealerr says this is fine. It could actually help us to get the right noseweight as we find it difficult to get to 100kg.

thanks

Vi

 

[MikeP]

A lot of continental caravanners can do this, as they have longer A frames which aren't shrouded in plastic or whatever. As long as you can fit a rack (Fiamma make a good one) and you keep within the noseweight figures for both car and caravan, then all should be well.

 

[vi]

thanks Mike

We have a Continental caravan so have the longer A frame. It does have a cover which came as an extra but the rack the dealer showed us fits over this. He showed us one already fitted to a similar caravan. The caravan noseweight is 100kg and the car 120kg.

We will probably look in more detail at this option,

Vi

 

[Rioja]

We have recently taken up cycling again and I was thinking of taking take two bikes on a rear mounted bike rack. I have an estate VW Passat and usually travel with the awning, aquarolls, wheel clamps, electrics etc etc in the back of the car. The car is slightly nose down, but with the bikes would be much more so. Do you think it would be a good idea to put the awning and poles in the rear washroom of my van ?

 

[MikeP]

Not a good idea to put heavy stuff in the rear washroom.

Many vans now have noseweights of 50-70kg, and adding a bike rack (about 7kg) and 2 bikes (about 26kg) could easily exceed the noseweight limit for the car. Check carefully.

Although aerodynamically poor, roof mounted bars are the safest for weight distribution.