Hi,

My almost-4yo son is now too damn heavy to carry around on a seat on my bike, so I want to get a tag-along or something like that. He already has a proper bike so the Trail Angel tow bar looked like a better idea – anyone got any comments on it?

Of course if I’m putting a tow bar on a mountain bike I’m not going to let it near my lovely Cotic or Superlight, so I best get a reasonable but cheap hardtail too…

I have a trail gator for longer trips with Jr.

It’s a pretty crap design, but Ive managed to get it to work passably with an innertube wrapped around Jr’s headtube and doing the bracket up eye-wincingly tight.

TBH it wouldnt take much to design in some kind of anti-roll bar but it’s american so it’s crap 😉

As for hanging it off your bike, much as n+1 rules, all you really need to consider is a spare seatpost/saddle to fit he bracket to that you can swap in and out of your pride and joy.

Oh yes, the trail angel attaches to the seat post too. I’m not so precious about that. The Angel does look more industrial (echos of the Orange Five, to be honest) than the Gator so maybe it will be a little more stable.

I had a trail gator, did suffer from leaning at first but solved that with a spanner and a bit of effort. I much preferred that approach to a tag along as we we able to take our nephew to the park on the towbar, then let him go off and do his own thing.

I’ve used both trail gator and tag-a-long. THe trail gator was OK once you do up the bolts bloody tight, the first time we used it they weren’t done up tight enough and dumped my daughter in the mddle of the street (a very quiet street where we’d chosen to test it). It was small and easy to take camping so she’d still ahve her bike.
Used a tag-a-long for a good while with both kids also (a trek model). It was great. My daughter would pedal on it so it gave you a real speed burst. My son was a lazy sod on it. My son was a lazy sod, prefering to sit back, and at times put his feet on its handlebars. He only fell off once though, I was half way up the hill before I thought it seemed too easy, turned around and saw him in tears 100m behind me. Bad dad award that day.
The tag-a-long got much more use and I used to commute with them on the back of it.

I can’t recommend the Follow Me enough.
Attaches to your bike via a special quick release skewer and attaches to Mini-me’s bike via another special axle.
No leaning, no nuts to tighten to extreme torques.

Follow Me here too – brilliant bit of kit.
Can be fitted to the carrier bike in a minute or two, while the kiddie bike can be fitted / released in seconds.
Takes 20″ wheel bikes too.
(Had a Trailgator and hated it. Bloody dangerous – even though I took hours trying to get it right)

http://www.cyclesense.co.uk/m53b0s485p10309/FOLLOWME_TANDEM_Follow_Me_2010

I use a trail gator and yeah they do have leaning issues but as above they are easily sorted with a bit of elbow grease. My lad loves it though, he gets his freedom and gets towed along when he’s knackered. I’d much prefer this to the tag along idea even if it is a crap design.

Adams tag a long and get the back rest for added safety. It goes on my fatbikes on the beach and on my 5 with no issues at all. Decent bit of kit