Really don’t need or want a proper tow bar (does it impact on your insurance if you have one fitted? I imagine its classed as a mod?).

Anyway, any (cheapish) recommendations that are secure for long journeys/motorway?

Have a look on http://www.roofbox.co.uk/ – they have a ‘configurator’ whatsit that’ll tell you what you can fit on your specific vehicle. (They’re also very competitively priced and great service, in my experience).

Theres the occasional horror story of people being refused insurance becasue its a modification, but the foot note to the story is its usualy resolved by actualy calling the company rather than having a tantrum when the computer says no.

Towbars are hardly a performance mod, so I would be really surprised if insurance were arsey. If you have a habit of reversing into other cars then they may, but not in day to day driving.

Consider what type of towbar you want, a swan neck will be more discreet but more expensive than a flange type bar, but a flange type bar can take a wider range of bike racks anyway, and you don’t need to fit the towball if you don’t want to.

Brand wise, anything really, they all have to be Type Approved for a vehicle the age of a focus, cheaper end of things Towsure or PCT, top end Brink or Witter. Avoid Fords own, as it will be a Brink or a Witter rebadged & costing a good £50 more. Got to cost in the price of single towing electrics and a small light board, don’t be taken in by a fitter telling you to get twin electrics fitted because unless you plan to tow a caravan and need to power an onboard fridge & charge a caravan battery you don’t need the twin electrics, just the one that powers the lights.

I bought one and fitted it myself from here:

http://www.towequipe.co.uk/Homepage.html

Bit fiddly but fairly straightforward. Only problem I had was with the wiring but found their helpline really useful and soon sorted the problem.

I’ve had a towbar on pretty much every car, never even thought to tell my insurance company – and anyway they save rear damage, from parking…

Tell them because it is a mod. You are adding to your car semi permanently so they could see it as a undeclared mod?

Plus a towbar can be used for other reasons?

Just being over-cautious really. If you reversed into someones car and cracked their bumper and the garage report cameback as towbar-interface they may refuse to pay? In addition (no idea here I admit) if someone parks and cracks their bumper you also have to pay as you are supposed to remove swan neck-ones when not in use?

I must admit I may be wrong as I’ve always assumed on the above points. 🙂

I had a Brinks Swan Neck fitted to our Subaru Outback and use it with an Atera Strada rack which came from the Roofbox Company mentioned above.

Towbar was fitted by a towbar specialist in Swindon and can be easily removed when not in use an leaving no unsightly towbar type stuff on the back of the car.

The rack is brilliant. Takes 4 bikes securely (with the extra 4 bike adaptor). The rack slides away and down from the car with bikes in situ so you can access the boot.

I’ll warn you though, this is not a cheap option. However, I have driven the length of the country several times with 3 or 4 bikes on the back of the car and the bikes and rack have remained solidly in place on the motorway.

Cost isn’t ‘too much’ of an issue. I don’t get on with roof racks (wont say anything too much on that!) and with the arrival of hora junior I’m conscious of the interior looking like a skip.

I’d go for a standard flange/twin bolt type tow bar, have had them on all my cars and insurance companies have never cared. Combine that with an Aiston bike wheel support rack and you’ve got the perfect solution. I’ve tried thule and pendle before and the Aiston rack is by far the best.

http://www.aistoncycleracks.co.uk

The arrival our our nipper coincided with the installation of our towbar and rack combo. The convenience of being able to get into the boot with the bikes on the back should not be underestimated when you have all of that small person related paraphernalia in the boot.

Witter removable towbar on my A6 Saloon, used with a 2 bike Thule 9502. When out at the trail everything removes and fits in the boot out of sight, keeps the theiving scumbags at bay especially as you car does not look like a bikers car with racks on etc.

konastoner, I have a way round this. I always take a hardened Mafia hitman with me and leave him stood behind a tree in the carpark. A few times I’ve comeback to the car and noticed one or two ‘slotted’ crims laying on the ground. 😈

I’ve a Witter towbar rack on sale cheap if you wanted one.

Only reason it’s for sale is my wife won’t let me fit a towbar to our already very long Volvo 🙂 So i’ve gone for a Thule clip on high mount rack which seems to be the half way compromise between a towbar mounting and a rack attached by straps. Certainly seems well made and came well recommended. Means not having to faff with chopping holes in the bumper and fitting extra electrics to get it to work.

+1 for Beamers recommendation on the Atera Strada.

I have one, and it is brilliant on the motorway. been up to hmm hmmph MPH with it on and no problems.

Also fits in the boot of my mazda 3 without having to put the seats down, something that the Thule equivalent wont do as it it a fair bit bigger

Judas Priest! Its pricey!

Pricey yes. Worth it, I would say so. Very satisfying to use (if a rack can be).

My previous rack was one of those that hangs on the tailgate using straps. Not an option with our current car due to the plastic trim on top of the tailgate.

It was a right faff using that rack. Putting it on the car, removing the bike wheels, tying the bikes on and the reverse of the process at the start of the ride and the complete process again for the homeward journey.

No such faff any more.

The rack also fits in the boot whilst we are riding to avoid any temptation for unsavoury types.

I did leave it on once though in a busy woodland carpark. Some numpty clipped the rack whilst manoeuvring the car in/out of their parking space and smashed the light cluster cover. No other damage (to the rack) and managed to stick the pieces back together but also obtained a spare from the roofbox company.

The rack also fits in the boot whilst we are riding to avoid any temptation for unsavoury types.

The Thule ones lock on, and in 6 years I’ve never had an issue.

I’ve got a Tradekar rack (from Roofbox) which padlocks shut. I must have had it for six years and no-one has ever messed with it in a car-park.

I fitted my own. Witter I think. Only difficulty was needing to remove a lot of the the shock absorbing padding/foam from inside the bumper, to make way for the steel.
The padding was much of the support for the bumper, so the bumper ended up a bit flimsy and hollow and didn’t sit quite as nicely.

The Atera ones also lock on, but still doesn’t stop some scrote giving it a try though does it!

Out of sight, out of mind and all that.

Exactly. The rack cost a fortune so I’d rather unlock it and put it in the car so that some scrote doesn’t spend couple of hours trying to get it off, maybe with success, maybe not but no doubt damaging it in the process.

I’ve got this one;
http://www.roofbox.co.uk/scripts/rbvehsel4_tab.php/car-accessories/buzz_rack_moose_4_bike_tow_ball_carrier_no_brh204/njNA_v3iVQGVal3GwhauPFQyGP2

It’s great – 4 bikes fit on without too much jiggling and I use some pipe lagging between them. For the money can’t fault it. Folds up small which is great when we’re camping.

I’ve been quoted £135 plus Vat (includes 2hours fitting) for a flange style towbar and doesnt require cutting the bumper. Is that a circa (good) ballpark price?

wwaswas – daft question but is there much ‘play’/movement at the wheel ends? I imagine the movement/suspension at speed would cause the bike(s) to waggle alittle and mean the toptube/belt-interface would rub your paint alittle?

not really – you wrap long tie downs through the wheels (the yellow strap in the photo on the link) – it stops it all flapping about in the breeze.

I do use some foam pipe lagging where frames are in contact with each other. If I was paranoid I’d put some helicopter tape around the frame at the contact points on the top tube.

I had a Thule 9403 (wheel support type) and I’d say this is not as convenient as that, tbh, if you only want to carry a couple of bikes a relatively short distance.

I switched ‘cos I needed to carry 4 bikes when we went on family camps and we use a roofbox. Four bike wheel support racks are both expensive and heavy and I was worried about exceeding the nose weight limit on my towbar.

The buzz-rack is easier to store too.

Funnily enough I got a Carbon456 recently and whilst I won;t be taking that camping with us I have been umming and ahhing about whether to use it on this rack – I’ve no worries about putting any of my steel frames ont here but in two minds on carbon. I guess I’d be worried abotu the Thule roofbar holder I’ve got that clamps on the downtube too, though so it’s more about me than the rack…

£135 is a good price for a towbar fitted – mine was £250 (but is a removable swan neck type one).

Sounds like a fair price to me. That’s about half what I paid for a removable swan neck with single electrics.

I’ve also got an Atera Strada here, brilliant at what it does, good access, rock steady and 10 seconds to mount it when you get the hang of it. That point above about carbon frames on hanging style rack is a good one, a wheel tray type rack can also take any odd shaped frame you throw at it.

I got mine off the roof box seconds/returns section – saved £100 over a new one.

It’s a good price. The guys I use as they’re cheaper than anyone else round here by about 10% (consistently over 3 jobs) charge 180 for a focus.

Halfords had their own brand and Thule bike racks reduced at the weekend. Not sure if they still have.

The mk1 Focus has a 50kg towbar loading limit (or at least, the mk 1.5 estate does but I think yours is the same) so that’ll rule out some racks and combinations. Assuming that you consider it important and something worth listening to anyway, I have no idea whether it is or not.

The Atera ones also lock on, but still doesn’t stop some scrote giving it a try though does it!

Speaking from experience, the locks on the roof-mounted Atera cycle carriers don’t stop a couple of scrotes from smashing the crap out of the jaws of the carrier and riding off on your prides and joy.

Top tip, don’t park on a packed car park at Manchester’s Trafford Centre on Easter Monday for a couple of hours, in the belief that your bikes are ‘securely’ locked to the top of your car. For when you find out that it’s the CCTV operator’s day off, there will be wailing and gnashing of teeth.

I can’t be arsed to read through this thread so this may have been said already:
I had a towbar fitted to my mk1 focus. Cost about £280 fitted with electrics. I wanted one that did not require cutting the bumper which meant that ball and extension was welded to a 10mm ish plate that ran vertically between the bumper and fuel tank and presumably then attached to the actual tow bar which was hidden by the bumper. All very well but when I had my Thule 3 bike rack on (the cheaper wheel holding one) loaded up with 2 or more bikes, it bounced a lot as the plate described above flexed. Basically try and get a tow bar set up with a substantial connection between ball and bar. You’ll also probably find 3 light bikes + rack is right on or over the nose weight limit of the car. I wouldn’t have put 3 DH bikes on mine.

You left your bikes on a bike carrier out of sight? I never did this even at a motorway service stations. Always someone with the car/take turns.

I briefly (and I mean literally 1 min) left my bike out of sight as I went to pay at the gym then into gym/glass windows viewing it. The gym is in sport city (empty) and I used a oxford lock- in that minute someone had a (failed) go at my cheap commuter.

You are mad.I get paranoid about my bike (covered) in the back of the car!

In hindsight, it was naiive and stupid of course.

My thinking was a) they’re locked up, b) there were loads of people around and it was broad daylight, with security guards and CCTV, c) it’s the Trafford Centre, full of yummy-mummies and pretentious middle-class gits, not Moss Side, and d) did I mention the locks?

Still, chalk it off to experience, won’t be a mistake I’ll be making again.

The mk1 Focus has a 50kg towbar loading limit (or at least, the mk 1.5 estate does but I think yours is the same) so that’ll rule out some racks and combinations. Assuming that you consider it important and something worth listening to anyway, I have no idea whether it is or not.

I wouldn’t worry about these load limits, as I can’t physically lift my wife’s horsebox hitch (even when empty), but it doesn’t seem to be a problem for the car(s).

I’ve wondered if it’s maybe one of those things drivers don’t care about but insurers and police notice after a crash 😆

B r seen many foci towing horse boxes? 😉

No, the towbar load on hers is 140kg – but the nose weight of the trailer is a damn site more, especially once double-horsed.