Rear PU bike rack

[Joe Gleason]

Looking at putting a reciever hitch on the back (welding it)

Then putting a 4 bike Rack system on it to pull behind...

Questions:
  Has anyone done this?  Work ok? Recommendations?

  2 Adult bikes to small childrens - figure weight should be 100lbs
   
  Any good way to weigh the tounge?

Comments would be greatly appreciated - thanks!

[mike4947]

Maybe 100 pounds for the bikes, but IMHO they alone will weight over 100 pounds. The receiver hitch will go about 40 and the rack between 15-30 as well. Now your talking well over 150 pounds, if not in excess of 200 pounds total added weight.

There are over 50 manufacturers of bike racks for RV's. Only one makes one suitable for the rear of a PU and when you call to order it they give you the third degree before letting you place an order.
 
A few facts.
#1 Since the distance from the coupler to the axle is apx the same as the distance from the axle to the position of the bike rack on the back, for every pound back there you'll take a pound OFF the trailer tongue weight.
#2 There isn't a trailer made that can tolerate taking 150 pounds off the tongue and still stay behind the TV at 60 mph.
#3 More suitable solutions include:
A) roof rack for the PU. Bikes ride in front of the axle so they contribute to, not take from tongue weight. You do have to remove them when raising the roof as PU roofs all have an apx weight limit of 150 pounds when raised.
B) roof rack for the TV. bikes can be a pain to get up there, and you do have to watch drive thru's, but you can take the bikes without the trailer.
C) My favorite; the on the TV receiver mounted rack. They come in several styles. One mounts clamp like onto the receiver head or the drawbar. Then there's the double drawbar mount that goes in the TV receiver and the trailer drawbar mounts in the bottom hole and the bike rack mounts in the upper one.
 
I have seen 3 succesful rear mount bike racks on PU's in over 30 years of towing trailers. All three were limited to TWO bikes and they all had to do some rearanging of weights (like adding extra propane and batteries to the tongue) to allow for even that much weight on the back.
It's not a weld the receiver on, slide the rack in and hook up the bikes project.
It needs lots of planning, several actual scale weights during construction, and more likely than not it will either overload the PU axle, make it uncontrolable when towing, or cause structural damage to the PU from the amount of weight being where no designer would have thought to place it.

[luvourjayco]

Joe we did exactly as you are thinking of doing. My answer DON'T DO IT!!!
We have towed our PU thousands of miles before we thought of the bike rack idea and dh carried it out, within 5 miles of home on the first trip with the rack when we has sway so bad I wanted to go home. Thankfully this trip was only an hour or we would have. Do yourself a favour and look at the alternatives. There are PVC racks for the top of the pu or front mounted racks for the TV. Why risk your safety for the sake of a couple hundred $$$.

[JonesFamilyJayco]

So far, I just use a simple bike rack that I attach to the back of my Explorer by way of 4 clips.  I usually am just taking 2 bikes and I have room for the trailer to fit behind the bikes.  I bought my bike rack at Wal-mart & it wasn't too expensive.  For my boy's bike and my tow behind trailer for my daughter, I just lay them on the roof rack of the Explorer (on a blanket) & secure them with come-alongs.

The only down side I can see to putting a bike rack on the pop-up instead of a system for your TV would be that you would not have a way to carry your bikes without the camper.

[Joe Gleason]

Thanks I just got back online ... Read everyones comments... I was really tossing on this... Had planned on putting more weight up front..etc.. but my gut was screaming "NO" on this one...

Thanks for the input and we will pass on the back rack..

My concern over a roof mounted bike rack.. I have a strap on (sounds twisted)... Does that cause extra air drag?

Thanks again for throughtful and well prented concerns!

[2manytoyz]

This gets discussed so often I have a webpage about it...
http://www.2manytoyz.com/racks.html

For anyone considering do such a mod, PLEASE take time to do the homework.  If you don't, then don't be surprised by the results.  Weigh your bikes, measure your tongue weight, weigh the camper.  Make sure you keep the tongue weight in the 10%-15% range.  This isn't rocket science.  If you need to add weight to the tongue, you can take a gray water container, mount it on the tongue, and fill it with clean water.  If you've already added a battery up front, you may already have more than enough weight.

Is your axle exactly half way between the rear bumper and the hitch?  Mine isn't.  That means a good portion of the weight is applied to the axle rather than subtracting from the tongue weight.

I've had a bike rack on the back of our camper for years.  I can't tell you how many hundreds of people told me it won't work.  When people see it in person, I get a "son of a gun" type of response.  

Do the homework...  

[wynot]

I wouldn't say to do it or not do it, but if you have a Utah, you don't want to do it, you're already underweight tongue-wise.  
 
One solution we have for our daughter's bike, is that it gets carried on the trailer tongue, wedged between the propane tanks and battery(ies).  It fits in snug, is down low, can be secured with two bungee cords or rachet straps.  This is a bike for a 10 year old, so it isn't large, but isn't small either.  Gives us another 40 lbs of weight in the tongue area, too.
 
Alternate idea is to mount a front receiver if available on your TV.
 
Since we don't know what you have or tow, we are a little restricted in specific comments.

[Michicampers]

Alternate idea is to mount a front receiver if available on your TV.

Hidden Hitch makes these for many trucks and SUVs - this set-up has worked out well for us, especially at times when biking trails we wanted to hit were too far from the campground to ride to.