Right,
I have a friend.
He has a Specialized Hardrock ('06), and his partner got herself a Specialized Globe last week.

So they could carry their youngest son on cycling 'expeditions', they are making use of my currently redundant CoPilot Limo child seat. As I still use the Blackburn EX1 rack which came with the seat when I bought it, they got a new one of their own.

They tried to fit their rack at the weekend there, and it's not looking good. The dropouts near which the lower contact/attachment points of the rack should fit are about six centimetres farther apart than the 'natural' width apart of the racks 'forks', suggesting that the rack forks would need to be prised farther apart with some force and kept under that pressure all the while.
None of us were happy with that idea. It didn't seem safe, and that was before a seat was attached (child within or not).

Her Globe is deemed a 'hybrid' according to him, but its a 'girly style' frame, with very low braze-on points due to the shallow seat stays, so she wouldn't be able to carry the seat at the correct angle anyway. Do you know if CoPilot can suggest alternatives to the EX1.

I have sent my friend links to both Blackburn and Bell (parent co.) who make CoPilot so he can ask them himself, but I hoped one of you good people may have encountered a similar issue and knew of a soulution.

Thank you

All the racks we have fitted seem to have this need to be spread too, not keen on the idea either but we've never had any problems come up. As for braze-ons, Post Moderne(from Zyro)do a replacement seat clamp with built in rack mounts that we've found to be very effective on smaller frames.

You can get longer seat stays for Blackburn MTN-1 racks. I imagine they'd fit OK. If you PM me I can have a look in the shop tomorrow and check it out for you.

Spreading the legs aparts should be OK – they're made for both road and MTB frames which have different hub widths.

Thank you gents.

I'll pass on the info after checking it out.

Druidh – what does 'PM' mean, and how does one do it?
Oh, wait, is it 'private message'? Let me try.