After enjoying countless beers over about a 1 month period pondering how to fit a bike rack to my OB expanda which would meet the following criteria:
- fold forward with the bikes on and not impede the front bed fold out
- allow access to the spare wheel
- involve no welding to the van ( I want to keep it as stock as possible for resale and I have a 200mm extension to the draw bar). Welding weakens this. At the time I bought my van either the dealer or Jayco head office wouldn't let me go to 300mm for the draw bar extension. I know of vans before and after mine that were allowed 300mm. Somebody might know the reason but I assumed that it was the cheap steel and risk of bending. (Maybe they knew what I had in mind for it).
I came up with the following cheap solution.
Make a substructure from H3 pine around the drawbar (no metal fatigue there) to clear the spare tyre and lash on with ocky straps in case of removal of spare wheel. Fit Fiamma carry bike pro to top of wood substructure. I haven't yet been able find square u bolts to fit but a tight fit around the draw bar but ocky straps is very strong and allow some flex. I am not a carpenter nor an engineer but happy to have my $300 all in job take a Pepsi test against any $1-2k job. I will admit it does' t look as sexy as other jobs.
As a word of warning I'm not sure what the legal requirements are for this sort of arrangement and I haven't been pulled up. If I do I am going to supply a tow rope and ask him to hook up his cruiser to it and see if he can get it off. As another warning I suggest that the ocky's are replaced every 6 months if in the weather.
- fold forward with the bikes on and not impede the front bed fold out
- allow access to the spare wheel
- involve no welding to the van ( I want to keep it as stock as possible for resale and I have a 200mm extension to the draw bar). Welding weakens this. At the time I bought my van either the dealer or Jayco head office wouldn't let me go to 300mm for the draw bar extension. I know of vans before and after mine that were allowed 300mm. Somebody might know the reason but I assumed that it was the cheap steel and risk of bending. (Maybe they knew what I had in mind for it).
I came up with the following cheap solution.
Make a substructure from H3 pine around the drawbar (no metal fatigue there) to clear the spare tyre and lash on with ocky straps in case of removal of spare wheel. Fit Fiamma carry bike pro to top of wood substructure. I haven't yet been able find square u bolts to fit but a tight fit around the draw bar but ocky straps is very strong and allow some flex. I am not a carpenter nor an engineer but happy to have my $300 all in job take a Pepsi test against any $1-2k job. I will admit it does' t look as sexy as other jobs.
As a word of warning I'm not sure what the legal requirements are for this sort of arrangement and I haven't been pulled up. If I do I am going to supply a tow rope and ask him to hook up his cruiser to it and see if he can get it off. As another warning I suggest that the ocky's are replaced every 6 months if in the weather.
