VW T5 Bike rack – your real world experience

Really pleased to have just got a new (to us) VW T5 campervan. Yay!

It’s a SWB tailgate model and will be used for camping trips and holidays as well as for mountain biking. So now just need to get a rear-mounted bike carrier for it and we’ll be ready for some biking trips. (Will not have space to carry bikes in the van)

I am after some feedback from other van owners on what bike carrier they have and any pros or cons of their model.

In particular, we are interested in the genuine VW one – yes I know it’s stupidly expensive, but we want to leave whatever rack we get on the van as a permanent fixture and we are willing to spend the extra for it to look good as well as function well.

I’ve had a look at one and have concerns that the jaws on the clamps that hold each bike are quite small ( much smaller that Thule ones for example) . Does anyone use one regularly? Do the clamps work ok will different tube shapes ie oversized or flattened tubes for example? Has anyone had any issues with them. Just worried that they may not grip sufficiently to secure bikes without any risk of slipping etc.

Have looked at the Atera Linea one as well which seems to have slightly bigger/longer jaws on the clamps.

Anyone know how the two compare in real world use. How securely are bikes held and how easy is it to mount three bikes together (allowing for different frame designs and shock placement etc on full sus bikes)?

Had a search on previous threads about both models. Haven’t found any posts with any concerns about the VW one’s clamps but just wanted to check on what users have found.

Would be really grateful for some feedback.

Do both racks work equally well? Other that the price and aesthetics, any real difference in practice?

Cheers.

After using the genuine rack on a friends T5 for all my mountain bikes i’ve never had a problem, or thought that the rack is anything but extremely secure and well designed. Fitted 4 full sized bikes to the rack, with everything from 1.8″ mud tyres to 2.5″ DH ones, and with both carbon and ally frames.

Only downside i can think of is that the base is quite high up, and so if you are short it’s a fair lift to pick up a bike and put it into place!

That’s good to hear. Thanks for yours feedback

Yes the height aspect isn’t ideal – I’m a rather diminutive 5′ 8″ – on a good day – so I know it could be a bit of a stretch.

It would be oh so embarrassing if I had to keep a little booster step in the van to help with loading/unloading. Oh the shame of it!

Didn’t buy one for our Swb – got a strada instead attached to the tow hitch.

Didn’t like the vw item being a permanent fixture – and reckoned it would impede rear visibility when travelling

We typically fit 5 bikes inside our kombi- and only need the rack when going on holiday….

Yes the tow bar ones do seem good, but unfortunately we just don’t have the storage space to keep one when not in use.

In terms of visibility, the VW one doesn’t seem to bad. We even went down to the VW showroom to sit in one their really plush Caravelles(very nice but bloody expensive) which had a rack on the back. When folded up and without any bikes, the rear visibility seemed pretty good, so not really too much of a problem when driving around without any bikes.

However with bikes on, the view is obviously compromised. I reckon this isn’t a major problem – we used to have high mounted Thule rack on a previous car which held the bikes in a similar position and we didn’t find it too bad.

Parents have one on theirs and it’s decent enough at carting bikes around – what annoys me is that when you want to get into the back of the van with bikes on you have to lift it and balance it 1/2 way open whilst fishing stuff out and it’s heavy enough to be a 2 man job with bikes on.

This is because the handlebars of the first bike will hit the roof when the tailgate is up. Suppose it depends on the van layout as to how much of an issue this is?

Visibility not really an issue – 90% of vans don’t have rear windows anyway so you’re no worse off you just get used to using mirrors more.

As mentioned, with the rack loaded, you can’t really get the tailgate lifted, although you can crack it a touch and reach through the gap. Pretty much the same with towball mounted racks tbh (those that “fold backwards out of the way don’t generally fold far enough to clear the massive top hinged rear door of the T5)

No issues with visibility in my experience, either with the rack loaded or unloaded, and you have nice big van sized door mirrors to help you see behind you anyway

Had a fiamma one on the T4 tailgate. It was OK, but fittings deteriorated over time, and a clumsy railway crossing bottomed out the suspension so the fully loaded rack put stress creases in the aluminium tubes. Got rid of it and went with Atera Strada (slide away 4x bike tow ball rack)

Much, much, much better.

Had it a few years now. Just back from another 3 week trip around france with it. Very convenient. easy to fit and remove. Holds 4 bikes without too much bother.

We have the VW rack on our camper.
Two bikes is easy once you get used to how they fit together although you may need some thin padding between the fork and dropout.
Three and four are more of a faff as you may well need to turn bars round through 90 deg.
You need to also be aware of the weight limitations of the rack – 70 kg I think.
You will need to invest in the VW uprated gas struts for the tailgate too.
The rack is very solid and in practice easy to use although bikes do project over the roofline so be aware of height barriers etc! It is designed not to interfere with the T5 lights and numberplate so a bonus there. The clamps have been fine and I have yet to find a bike that will not fit.
I am also 5’8″ and carry a small folding stool in the van to make loading and clamping easier.
My only concern is that the rack is secured with two 5mm hex bolts and is not particularly thief proof so replacing these with T25 bolts or similar may be worthwhile.
Hope this helps and if you would like any further info feel free to email me.

We have the Atera Strada as above on a T5. Just back from a 2 week trip around europe with it and its great. Can open the tail get with no problems.

The only issue is that if you want use a mtb on the inside rack you have to loosen the stem and turn the bar 90 degrees. Not a problem for us bought a three bike rack and use the outside two!

Add a another one for the towbar – we have the Thule eurosomething which takes 4 bikes – stored round the side of the house when not in use (most of the time)

those that “fold backwards out of the way don’t generally fold far enough to clear the massive top hinged rear door of the T5)

Never had a problem with ours – folds out the way no worries

Really good rack, easy to tip and get into the boot- no need to upgrade the struts on the back door.

Highly recommend

Thanks for the feedback.

Stoner/Mysterymove/Andy – the tow bar ones do seem good. However, as I said before, unfortunately we just don’t have the room to store the carrier when we are not using it. We are limited therefore to the tailgate type.

With this in mind it was the Linea model in the Atera range that we were considering.

Hope your trips to Europe were good and you got in some decent biking.

Old-mtber. Good to hear that the clamps seem fine. We had thought that we might have to upgrade the struts. The VW ones seem very expensive. Anyone got any recommendations for cheaper alternatives?

I suppose it’s always a bit of a chess game arranging any more than 2 bikes on these sorts of racks – part of the compromise you make really.

Old-mtber/Maxtorque/Nick – how do you find that the wheel straps. They seem to made from a durable nylon/canvas material ( a bit like toe straps) and don’t look as good as the rubber/plastic ratchet ones on the Thule racks for example. Are they ok? Is it possible ( or even necessary) to replace them with better/ different ones.

if you’ve got room for bikes at home then surely you have room for a tow bar rack? Or just keep it in the back of the van. You can get folding ones that go quite compact.

I’ve had a Fiamma rack on my barn door t5 with no issue for over a year now, although last weekend the spring in one of the ratchet straps on one arm failed. I have heard of folk with problems with the barn dor one springing off the van when closing doors.
I had a Fiamma one on my t4 too, which was superb for the 4 years it was on there.
I have friends with tailgate t5s who use the vw one with updated gas struts, they seem to be issue free, both guys have had them 2 years or so.
My rack works well even with 2.4 wide tyres on my ” trail” bike, although the 2.1s on the hack bike seem a better “fit” . Wheel straps hold either perfectly well.
Biggest issue with t5 as against t4 is that the lights and number plate are higher, so racks are higher on the back on the van Ito avoid using separate lighting boards.

Nicrg – Straps are fine but I agree do look a bit cheap. Work on the same principle as a toe strap and would be easily replaceable I imagine.
I looked at the Atera rack but in the end went for the VW as it is made for the vehicle.
One other point if using the inside rack you need to make sure the pedal/wiper interface is clear and to watch out if opening the tailgate with a bike installed that the handlebars do not gouge your roof!

Nicrg – I had my T5 gas struts uprated by these guys – SGS – about £12 I think – and now they hold up my Fiamma rack with two bikes on no problem.

I have found the Fiamma rack pretty good although I’ve had to replace two arms so far due to spring failure (had it four years) and I find the wheel straps too small for 29ers with 2.35 tyres. I’m about your height and getting the inner most bike off on certain inclines is pretty difficult!

I’ve got a reversing camera (Kenwood, links in to my stereo head unit) which is fitted just above the number plate and it’s superb.

I love the VW rack on my T5 Cali, it’s great but does gave some limitations…. It’s clearly designed by and for road bikes, as I can fit 4 road bikes with ease and still open the door and it stays right up without question.

But as soon as I’m trying to fit mountain bikes it’s a different challenge.
Firstly wide handlebars mean you’ll end up with dents in you roof when you open the up n over door (yep, oops)
Secondly I can’t get more than two mtbs on the back without swivelling bars round, challenges with wide pedals and changing saddle heights to accommodate it all.. But you do get used to it and once you’ve got the knack it’s not a problem.

One thing to note is the clamp jaws are designed (well) for traditional round steel tubes. Any odd shape or oversize tube is likely to get chipped and crushed if you don’t use a soft rag between frame and clamp, and do it up gently, just firm enough to hold, not crush, be gentle on super light carbon frames (wasn’t me thankfully, but my mate crushed his Scott carbon top tube being overzealous with tightening it up)

The fact it’s so high up is great, as you can park in normal car park spaces and overhang the bonnet of the car behind.. Plus it means the reversing sensors still work.

We’re getting our T5 next week. Guy we’re getting it off is a biker and reccommended the Altera Strada to us so thats what we’re going with. Reading around, I’ve seen nothing but good reviews on them too.

I have the Altera Linea tailgate one and get on well with it. Its not a permanent fixture on the Cali like most of the VW ones seem to be. It takes under 5 mins to fit or take off and holds the bikes nice and secure. As standard they supply 3 wheel trays & arms but you can get a 4th option. I’ve only used it for up to 2 MTBs or 3 road bikes though. Three bikes does take some juggling of bars and positioning of the bottom brackets so they dont clash.
There have been cases of the VW ones being nicked as the fixing bolts are all accessible once fitted (fit tamper proof bolts to overcome this). With the Altera the bolts to hold the rack to the van can’t be accessed without opening the tailgate.
Never considered a towbar one as I dont have a towbar, extra £500 to get a proper Westfalia one fitted would have made it an expensive rack.

Dwarf – cheers for link to the gas struts.

Mister T – I think most of the rear mounted ones do have some limitations. It would be used for both road bikes & MTBs. As long as there is a knack to it I don’t mind if it does take some juggling. Not sure if the tow bar ones are necessarily better in that respect. I always tend to put some sort of protection on tubes when I clamp them them anyway, but as long as the smaller VW clamp jaws still manage to cope with odd shaped tubes it’s ok.

The van has reversing sensors so yes it’s also a bonus that they would still work with the tailgate mounted racks.

Owen. Good to hear from someone with the Linea rack. Sounds like it does the job equally as well, but it just doesn’t look as smart. Are the clamps a decent size and what about the wheel straps? Also good point about the bolts. Would probably fit tamper proof ones if we went for the VW rack.

We would mostly only be carrying either 1 or 2 bikes (usually 2 MTBs or 2 road) on a regular basis with probably just the odd occasion where we would carry 3. Old mtber/ Mister T – do you tend to use the 1st & 3rd slots when carrying 2? Does this make things a lot easier?

And also a good point about tow bar mounted ones. The van doesn’t have a tow bar fitted, so fitting one and then buying either the Atera Strada or a Thule one, would bring the overall cost to nearer £1000!!!

Interesting to hear people have had issues fitting more than a couple of MTBs on the VW one. Never had a problem, and have fitted 4 MTB’s of various sizes (but maybe 4x large framed ones might be tight?) but it can take a bit of bike jenga, and having a dropper seat post means a bar/seat interface is easier to avoid.

Here’s three pretty big bikes all on without too much hassle:

Cheers for the pic Maxtorque.

Bike jenga early in the morning can be a bit of a head-mess. I remember an old Thule rack of ours where I’d end up head butting walls in frustration.

However, it’s nothing that can’t be eased by keeping a photo on your phone of a previous successful strategy/layout I’d imagine.

Maxtorque That’s impressive… Yep size of bikes might be my issue…. But you’ve set the standard there, I’ll have to try harder.

Btw, do you get bar/roof interference when you lift the door?

Another towbar here I’m afraid.
Westfalia detachable towbar fitted for circa £300 and Thule rack for around the same.
You can also now get a Thule towbar rack that folds when not in use to make it easier to store.

Been using mine for 4 years no problems even with 4 full sussers, you do have to jiggle a bit if you keep putting different bikes on to know which way around. If you use a dropper or drop the posts its easy without moving bars, I offset the bikes left/right to assist with clearance.

Clamps are no problem. I even use a fat bike wheel and strps no problem. Visibility…use side mirrors, but remember you have a bike rack when parking.

If only three bikes space them out and fit the last one with the extension it leans the bike back and makes putting three big fullsussers on a piece of wee wee,

If its a California you’ll have a sliding seat. Just take out or move the two stops in the sliding rails and you can move the seat forward to get in the boot without needing to open the boot.
Although as mentioned gas strut upgrade makes it easy otherwise hold it up but not if you have 800mm bars on the inside track nearest the van. its fine from the second track.

I also have a towbar but dont use such a rack as I’m out three times a week and its a proper pita taking one on and off all the time for me. I use the towbar for extra luggage space when we go away tho.

Ive had not problems just bought extra lockable clamp screws from campervantastic as a deterrent when ot staying somewhere ages like just poppoing to services.

I’ve been using the Thule one that hangs from the top of the rear door and secures under the door. It works prefectly well but I think the distance between the bikes is a little smaller than the VW rack. This means that you have a lot of faffing around getting the bikes to fit together without bumping against each other. When the rack eventually does fall apart (eightish years at the moment) I think I’ll be getting a VW one though.

Bought a VW one via fleabay a few months back.

More than happy with it. Have only carried two bikes up till now, but can’t see how three or four would be a problem.

Considered a tow bar rack for all of five seconds. LWB, on street parking and no where to keep it meant it was a no no.

It’s currently in bits having had it powder coated in black to match the van.

Chainline – useful info – thanks.

Interesting to hear that even with a tow bar you still choose to use the VW rack. And I can see the hassle of having to fit it each time you head out with the bikes.

Do you have a link by the way to the lockable clamp screws? Had a look on campervantastic & couldn’t see anything.

Wonder how many tailgate owners have dents in their roof from handlebar ‘accidents’. Easy mistake to make I’d imagine.

Alpin – my thoughts exactly about the parking issue and the storage. Live on a narrowish terraced street with everyone vying for parking spaces. Too many cars and not enough spaces. Not sure we’ll be too popular with neighbours now we’ve added to the problem.

Atera Strada is the way forward!

Quick question for the people with up rated gas struts, when you aren’t carrying bikes, how hard is it to close the tailgate?

Mine regularly has 2 downhill bikes and 2 hard tails, the clamps are shite, fine on round tubes or if you can position the bikes to clamp seat tubes/post but that’s to much phaff for me so I modified mine, I replaced the 3 fixed clamps with Thule style from a euro rack, the wide ones that are designed for irregular/hydroformed/oversized tubes, only problem I had was the threaded rods are not long enough to take the Thule clamps so I got a mate to machine up stainless threaded rods to suit.
Other mod was the wheel straps, got so used to using the thule ratchet type I replaced the crappy nylon straps with the thule type, so much easier with 4 bikes on.
Another tip is if you turn the bars parallel to the frame on the first 2 bikes you can still have the roof up whilst the tailgate is open, although not with double crown boxxers fox40’s etc, single crown fork is fine on my van but it’s close so check.
I learnt the hard way, didn’t have downhill bikes on but a bike with a lefty and forgot to make sure bike was on the correct way round, arrived on site opened tailgate raised roof, expensive!

I have uprated struts for when I had a tailgate rack. They’re fair bit more oomph and I have to put a bit more effort into pulling the door down. But Mrs Stoner can do it and she weighs less than one of my farts.

My struts maybe available for a swap for anyone that is thinking of needing to uprate. Just need to check t4 spec vs t5.

Atera Strada DL on T4, nice bit of kit. Tailgate opens far enough before it hits my 720mm bars to allow decent access to the back of the van.

andyfla – how far does your tailgate open with the Thule? My mates got one for sale, I’d discounted it as I’d read that only the Atera worked with vans.

Another strata user here as the vw is expensive, not really very secure, a friend had his removed while parked with the bikes on it …
The strata works really well and when folded slides under our spare bed so it’s really quite small and no hassle to keep stored. As said before if you only have 2 bikes use the two outside spots and you can access your tailgate. A cheaper option is the Thule Hangon range which tilt as we’ll but aren’t as good and you would need a light board.

Clamps on the Linea are a very good size, never had an issue in clamping a variety of bikes. Its either the toptube or seatpost you are clamping anyway rather than a mega section downtube. The wheel straps could do with being a bit longer, fine for normal road & MTB rims/tyres but they are to short for 80mm deep section rims on the TT bike. You can feed a toestrap through the cradle though and use that instead.
Tailgate racks also make a good drying line when camping 😉

Scotsman. Did you find it easy enough to swap the straps over to the Thule style ones? Are the holes in the wheel trays wide enough and if so which alternative straps did you go for (any links?)

I had been wondering if there was a way to swap 2 of the clamps for the ones from my old Thule clip-on rack to make it easier for larger/odd shaped tubes.

I just feel that if you are paying the sort of premium price involved with the VW one, there shouldn’t be any weak points. In an ideal world the VW rack would have the clamps of either the Atera or Thule racks, the rubber ratchet wheel straps of the Thule ones, and lockable knobs on each bike locking arm.

However, it doesn’t so I suppose it’s a case getting the best compromise available.

We have a Thule Euroway G2, it folds flat and the wheel supports/lights slide in, it lives in the boot of our Civic permanently. It would almost certainly fit under the rock and roll bed, and with the amount of tilt there is a good change your tailgate will open without hitting it.

Racks are getting heavier now (I assume due to the crash testing) so being able to lift it off the ball and dump it straight into the boot is a big plus over lugging it into the house/garage and bashing your shins on it!

@nicrg

http://www.campervantastic.com/product.php?prod=742&cat=

Cheers Chainline – not sure why I couldn’t find them.

One question. Are all 3 lockable, or is it just 1 lockable nut & 2 normal ones?