Cycling in Waterloo Region

[Canard]

I just put the bike in the back of my car as I hate the idea of rocks and what not hitting it. I have heard, however, that people have accidentally driven into their garage with their bikes on the roof of the car, so that's something to consider.

Yikes - I can't imagine forgetting you have a bike on the roof and doing that!  But I won't do a roof rack due to wind resistance and the hit in fuel consumption (I'm a hypermiler).

I drive a matrix so it'll swallow a whole bike when I have to drive to the start of a ride. I have also used one of those trunk racks with the straps and driven 2 bikes to Barrie and 3 bikes to Vaughan on it. I was worried at first but with all the straps cinched down tight everything seemed really solid. I was worried about getting rear-ended more than anything falling off. I was really surprised at how solid it was considering the cheap appearance.

If the rack you want is 2" receiver only, they make 1-1/4" to 2" adapters, wal-mart even sells 'em. Probably TSC or princess auto also.

The Prius can eat my bike, but only if I take the wheel off (I suspect the Matrix is the same; the rear cargo volume is similar).  I don't really mind the act of taking the wheel off, but I just hate setting my bike upside-down on the ground (which is sometimes sharp gravel), which is eventually going to chew up my seat and handlebars.  I also don't like setting my bike in the back of the car because of how it sits on the crank arm - I'm worried that over time, this will damage the bearing.  I also worry about having lose cargo in the event of a collision.

The 2" vs. 1-1/4" thing is driven mostly by my dad, who is adamant that I go with a 2" receiver because is convinced (and he's right) that a smaller receiver will introduce more wobble and play.  But he also has a massive Diesel truck, so he's used to everything being massive and overbuilt.  A 2" isn't available for the Prius and it would be sort of ridiculous to even attempt something that large, I think.

The hitch lends itself to other uses which you may not yet envisage. I adapted my bike carrier into a ski carrier (because my roof won't support a load) and also ended up hitching a light trailer for kayaks (for the same reason). The 1-1/4" is perfectly adequate for these uses, so don't worry if your car manual is not recommending a 2" ( a capacity which might tempt people to hook up heavier items than the vehicle is built for).

Oh yeah, I'm very familiar with modding racks!    I loved the system for the smart.  You buy a "base rack" which is a T-slot extrusion frame, and then the idea is you'd buy smart's own accessories to convert the rack into whatever kind of carrier you wanted.  I just bought the base rack, and built my own adapters - for my bike, for my snowboard, and then even for my pocket bike (I used to race in an organized minimoto league.).

   
Rack for my smart fortwo for my pocketbike.

   
Racing at Mini Indy.  I miss these days!

As for the carrier itself, I went with a cheap hanging-type, and it seems to me to do the job, and has caused no evident harm to bikes. Mind you, I'm not extravagant or fussy with the bikes, as my friends with the celestial models are paranoid about theft and it's not worth the worry to me.

The problem with a hanging carrier for me is that there are cables that run along the bottom of my upper tube - so I can't use a hanger there.

For what it's worth, my parents have the same style of bike carrier as the Yakima Holdup (Thule's version, I think), and it works very well.

This one has caught my eye - mostly because it looks almost exactly like something I would have designed at work, anyway - small US shop, well built, sturdy and the locking mechanism into the receiver tube is fantastic (zero wobble).  It's as much as the Yakima Holdup, but the clincher for me is a) no straps at all, and b) the mounting method to the receiver.  I also like how I can buy just the 1x bike version, and if my other half eventually gets into biking, I can buy another tray, and bolt it on!