Bike Racks for Cars

A trunk bike rack is one of the more popular, straightforward styles of bike carriers on the market today. One of the primary reasons for this is the ease of loading and unloading of bicycles as compared to the other option for many small cars, which is a roof rack. Lifting a bicycle head high or higher, balancing it and fixing it onto a roof rack can be a sketchy operation at best. At worst, bicycles can tip over damaging the vehicle, damaging the bicycle, or even injuring the person attempting to load it. Many times with a roof rack you need to get the wheel perfectly aligned into a narrow track or even lock the front forks in place on a fork mount. The point being, you need to be pretty accurate while simultaneously balancing the bike you’ve lifted up to head high or higher. Again, needless to say, this can be tricky. For all these reasons and more, a trunk mounted bike rack can be very appealing.

With a trunk bike rack, often times you don’t need to lift the bike very high at all; maybe chest high. Plus, you are usually simply straddling the frame on two outwardly protruding carry arms. This is a much bigger target and requires much less finesse. This is especially true when you’re talking about mounting three or four bytes at a time. Again, the roof rack option, I’ll totally viable, just takes more of an effort. For the casual weekend rider, more often than not, a trunk bike rack is a great solution.

(One thing worth noting however, is that roof racks do have some advantages when it comes to versatility. For example, if you look at Thule or Yakima roof racks, they come with an abundant array of optional attachments were things beyond bikes including canoe or kayak carriers, surfboard or windsurf carriers, ski and snowboard carriers, in general cargo carriers, and the list most certainly goes on. Of course if you are only ever going to need to transport bicycles, this is of no use to you. We just know we would mention it).

Another reason many people choose to go with a truck mounted bike rack is that they are only transporting their bikes on occasion, and therefore prefer not to have a permanently mounted bike rack on their car. Most of today’s trunk mounted bike racks are very quick and easy to attach and detach from your vehicle, so it will never get in your way in your regular, day-to-day driving circumstances. To be fair though, one DIS-advantage to this kind of setup is the security (regarding theft) is not as great as with a more permanent rack carrier. All this means is that when you get to your riding destination, you might want to consider detaching the rack and storing it safely inside your vehicle while you are away. This is something you don’t have to worry about when your bike rack is permanently mounted to your car. Just something to think about.

While all the major bike rack companies offer trunk mounted bike rack options (i.e. Thule, Yakima, Bell, Schwinn, Allen etc), one that stands out among the crowd has got to be Saris, and in particular the Saris Bones Trunk Mount Rack. Not only is it one of the more versatile racks, adapting to all kinds of vehicles from your standard family sedan with a trunk to flat back minivans and SUVs to being able to adapt and work equally well on cars with spoilers which can sometimes “spoil” efforts to use a trunk mount bike rack, but it is also one of the best looking, most fun designs you will find.

Yes, it might seem odd to talk about a cool, fun design when it comes to bicycle racks. None the less, when you look at the Saris Bones Trunk Mount Rack System, you’ll know what I mean. It was created and designed by renowned Italian designer Fabio Pedrini. Leave it to Italian designers to take something as boring and functional as a bike rack and turn it into a piece of art.

The Saris bike rack is made of 100% recyclable, non-rusting, injection molded material which is the strongest on the market. He uses ratcheting anti-sway straps to stabilize the bikes and keep them secure while also separating bikes onto different levels when carrying more than one at a time. And you have your choice of racks that can handle two, three or even four bikes at a time. Add to that the fact that you can choose from a multitude of colors, and you soon realize why Saris Bones bike racks are unique in the marketplace for trunk bike racks.