Damn, that looks REALLY nice. Did you ante up for the all aluminum or get the poly covered aluminum one? I'm still trying to decide what cover I want to go with using a platform hitch rack.
Or, my favorite option, don't live in Southeastern Michigan. haha ?4 bike Allen locking hitch mount. $139. Works as well as the Thule I had stolen. Lesson learned. Use a locking hitch pin or get a locking rack.
Fortunately I was on my bike when it happened. Unfortunately it was stolen in Mid-Michigan during a camping trip which made it a real pain to get the bikes home.
I went with the vinyl-over-aluminum laminated construction - Roll-N-Lock LG122M Locking Retractable M-Series Truck Bed Tonneau Cover for 2019-2020 Ford Ranger | Fits 5.0 Ft. Bed
I'm always fascinated by theft stories like this. It seems like the type of person who is interested in a nice hitch mount bike rack is not the same type of person who would stoop to such low character and petty theft. I could see some low life stealing a bike, but the rack just seems like a weird choice. The world is crazy stupid place that's for sure.
All interesting points. Ones I certainly I would've (and have) thought of and taken into account, but probably not to this extent. It's always interesting hearing about other people's experiences and how those shaped their decisions (my favorite thing about getting to know people). I've seen plenty of hitch mounted bike and cargo racks too, and never seen one bent in such a way. So this sort of thing is something that, though I obviously know could be possible, was outside the realm of realistic occurrences in my mind. But since you've seen it happen, it's now one of the first things you think about regarding this. Very interesting and thanks for sharing!Well, for one, lots of racks specify NOT to use them on the back of an RV or trailer. The concern is that the increased overhang and/or increased bounce (especially when you're talking about basic trailer suspension) creates a whole lot of extra dynamic forces. I've seen a lot of severely bent cargo platforms and bike racks over the years. Here's a bike rack:
0718180753 by Nate, on Flickr
So first, you need to be sure that the hitch on your trailer is rated for your load PLUS enough room for the extra dynamic forces (that are a lot harder to measure). Second, the rack itself needs to be rated well enough. Kuat says absolutely no to using it in this scenario. Which means I'd have to buy another rack. The only platform rack I KNOW is rated for such use is the 1upUSA HD rack, and only for 2 bikes maximum.
The other scenario at play is accessing the back of the trailer. My camper is not a "teardrop" per se. I've seen some refer to it as a "squaredrop" instead. Whatever. I have a big access door on the bcamper that swings to the side. I would ALSO need one of those swing-out adapters to access the back. Problem with that is the swingout adapters look too tall and would likely interfere with my back door, anyway. So fitment is a problem.
Then there's the matter of getting from camp to the trailhead, if it's not very close. Need to be able to move bikes easily enough with the tow vehicle. Sure, moving hitch racks around would be possible. I have fit problems with the other tow vehicle for my teardrop in that the 1upUSA side retention pin system won't work with the bumper cutout in the Subie. No problem for the truck, but I had the trailer built to order years ago. When I was pulling with the car, it was simpler by far to use roof trays when towing. My wife wasn't pleased with that (she can't lift her bike that high), but we really didn't have any other choice.
Now, with the truck, in the bed is the best solution by a long shot. It addresses every single other concern or compatibility issue I've had.
There's absolutely an element of overloading and generally poor load management going on with the failures I've seen, too. Certainly there are people who manage to carry bikes behind trailers (especially teardrops) safely. For me, after entirely too much research, I decided it wasn't worth the spend to make it work when I realized that other ways could work as well or better for my uses.
Well the bending is caused by the bouncing. It's all the same loading and failure mode. So we're ultimately talking about the same thing.There's absolutely an element of overloading and generally poor load management going on with the failures I've seen, too. Certainly there are people who manage to carry bikes behind trailers (especially teardrops) safely. For me, after entirely too much research, I decided it wasn't worth the spend to make it work when I realized that other ways could work as well or better for my uses.
I think the bouncing is a big deal for the pivots on most racks, rather than outright bending like I showed in the pic. I know most of the commercial racks specifically say not to go off-roading with them for very similar reasons. Most of them put this information on their websites nowadays, so it's searchable before making a purchase.
My wife and I love to ride, so most of our trips will involve riding. So far, all of our trips in the camper have involved riding. Our first trip 3 days after picking up our camper was a 3200mi round trip to Sedona, AZ for the Sedona mountain bike festival. Much of the time, we are able to camp fairly close to the trails we plan to ride, but some places that hasn't worked out. The mtb festival was one of them. With as far as we were traveling and with as many people as we knew were going to be there, we didn't want to hunt for open campsites (free or not) after we got there. We wanted a reservation in hand so we knew where to go after 3 days of driving. To get that, plus showers, we ended up about a half hour drive outside of Sedona in the next town over. Which meant we needed to transport bikes on the car once we dropped the camper.
We tried one thing on this trip that we didn't like.
20170302_075720 by Nate, on Flickr
20170226_160446 by Nate, on Flickr
This arrangement made the drive, but the clearances were just too tight for future use. I had to be super careful of turning radius, because the rack would hit the toolbox. Also, steeper articulation angles would result in contact between the ball latch and the bottom of the bike rack.
I wanted to bring the Kuat because I had a workstand for it (whole reason I bought that particular hitch rack, was to have that workstand for bike/camping trips). I've now realized that's not a feasible plan, and use the roof trays on top of the Subie.
The Exodux rack is going to work great for the Ranger when the rack manufacturer gets the Ranger mounting plates fabbed up.
Nice. You have a TC Teardrop. Mine was a similar sort of build-to-order arrangement, and I considered a TC. I like their looks and options a lot. But when I was shopping, TC's builds were I think 9mo+ out. The manufacturer I chose, Hiker Trailer, was only 3mo (though they're more like 9mo nowadays). Mine's a good bit lighter than you stated, though. It's less than 1,000lb dry, and right at 1400lb fully loaded for a trip. Sure, I had to drive the Subie pretty conservatively, but it did well enough (except for the supercell t-storms and the microburst in Missouri that got me to pull off the road for half an hour or so). I averaged about 19mpg while towing, even though the mtns of NM and AZ, which wasn't bad at all, but the gas tank size had me stopping to fuel up more frequently than I cared to. The engine was also revving more than I liked at times, so I had to pay attention to that more than anything and adjust speed accordingly in places.Well the bending is caused by the bouncing. It's all the same loading and failure mode. So we're ultimately talking about the same thing.
That's an interesting camper. I was going to ask you about it when you said some call it a "squaredrop" or whatever. I've seen similar designs and shapes before, but not that one specifically. Though I suppose I think you said you had it custom made, so that would make sense that I'd never seen it before. How much does it weigh? Because having that small Subie pull it 3200 miles across the country and back seems like quite the feat. Our teardrop weights in a 1200lbs dry and my old Crosstrek had a heck of a time pulling it just for weekend trips around our local area. Certainly wouldn't have even attempted a cross country trip with mine. One of the reasons we ended up getting the truck as soon as we did was to make that much easier.
Here's ours. First with the Subie the day we picked it up. Second with the truck before our week long Great Lakes tour last August. It's got a little bit more of the teardrop shape, but still some square/sharp edges in the back.
Pretty cool that you've heard of TC Teardrops! I find that not many people have. Must've really done your research when shopping. We really like the design and shape as well. And the options were what really pushed us over the edge. To be able to get exactly what you want to the point where no 2 are exactly alike is great. They even added a few things that weren't on the options list and some things just custom for us, which is nice. We ordered ours in October and picked it up in April, so about 6 months. And winter months too which is nice, didn't eat into our camping season activies. Plus their shop is only about 4.5hrs from where we live, so we could go pick it up and take it home in a day.
Nice! Unfortunately my fatbike is quite a bit bigger than that road bike. haha It barely fits diagonal in the bed, even with the front tire off. hahaJust barely, but it fits even with the front wheel on.
