Cheap Pickup Bike Rack

I am a firm believer in spending the money on really good gear WHEN IT IS NECESSARY. That said I am always looking for ways to get that gear for less OR build that gear for WAY less.  I like to build stuff and have through the years built my own kayak and bike racks because Thule and Yakima while a good product have hoodwinked the public into thinking they have to spend LOTS of money on a rack.  This just isn't the case in spite of what they tell you at the store.

For instance: If you want to put 2 (just two) kayaks on the roof of your whatever the conventional way to do this is to purchase a base rack ($300) and then a individual saddle system for EACH boat ($100 EACH).  OK, now we are up to $500.  That is just frigging stupid.  All we need to do is carry the boats.  The whole point is to paddle the boats in wild, beautiful and exotic places, the rack is incidental for Pete's sake.  $500?  I bought a kayak stacker for $70 (this was at least 10 years ago) and built a rack using wood, aluminum angle, foam, rope, screws and what have you for a TOTAL of $100.  My rack would carry1- 6 boats and was DEAD solid.  I used some form of this type of rack with the SAME kayak stacker for over 10 years without a problem.  I carried boats thousands of miles from Vermont to Georgia and back, I carried a full rack for hundreds of miles.  White water boats, sea kayaks, lumber, whatever.  Don't believe the hype.  Build your own.

So the latest rack is for carrying bicycles in a pickup truck.  You can go the same route for bicycles and buy a Thule or Yakima base rack and individual attachments for each bike but much the same as kayak racks it is going to cost you.  So, years ago I worked at a wonderful little used bike shop in Burlington, Vermont called Planetary Cycles.  There they had boxes of used and old bike stuff collected through the ages and I built a bike from parts that I am still riding today.  I also found all sorts of giblets of future use (GOFU) one of which was a cheap aluminum high flange hub.  I always intended to build it into a wheel but look what I did instead.

The rest of the rack is pretty straightforward stuff: one board of reasonable strength (plywood is probably best) I used 1/2 inch plywood.  Some way to attach the fork to the board. Old hubs if you can find them or the standard fork mounting block which are readily available and NOT expensive ranging from $15 to $25 each.  Most bike racks on vehicles are fixed and this makes some sense for security etc.  However, this one I wanted to be able to use in any truck or SUV so I fixed some closed cell foam to the underside to prevent it from sliding around and it works great. I actually took it for a test drive with 1 bike (more bikes would be more stable) on the interstate at 55 mph, round corners quickly and city potholes: the board did not move and the rear wheel of the bike did not move.    There is no reason that the rack be bolted down assuming you are driving around in a normal manner.  I think I would NOT want the rack fixed if there were an accident or rollover. Total investment: $40  HA!!