Santa was feeling a bit flush this year so the OH got a bike to replace that Halford’s pile of crap she had. Now it looks like I need a bike carrier.
the car is a Honda CR-V with spare wheel on the back door. With the height of the car and a tendency to carry a kayak on the roof, I’m looking for a 2 bike carrier to fit to the rear of the car. I’d prefer something to fit on the towball as these seem to have more security (ie locking the carrier to the car) but the spare wheel gets in the way of most of them. Spare wheel mounts are an option but don’t seem to have any security.
Would the STW massive have words of wisdom they’d care to share?

ta

Buy a van 😉

I did the whole people carrier, kayaks on roof, bikes on towbar, gear in the back thing for far too long. A van IS the answer.

We used a spare wheel mounted one when we had a 4×4 with a wheel on the back. Fitted pretty well. For security I just put a lock through the bikes and into the hole on the tow-bar. Whatever you do you’ll need an extra lock anyway for proper security. That said we have a van-like 4×4 now and everything goes inside 🙂

How far does the towball protrude from the back?

I have a Thule 9403 that works well and fits on vehicles with rear mounted wheels as long as the draw bar for the ball provides the clearance needed.

The ball doesn’t clear the wheel, so although the 9403 or similar would probably work it would mean buying a 3 bike rack but only having space for 2.
A van would be a good idea but to get something with more space than a CRV would probably mean even worse fuel consumption than I’m getting now. I’ll look into it.
the spare wheel jobs look like best shot, as it means we’d still have access to the boot without fannying about taking the bikes off the carrier because SOMEONE put their handbag in the very back of the car.

cheers

As a solid piece of engineering you can’t beat a Maxxraxx; we have carried 4 quite easily and it is pretty quick to take down and bung in the back; also has a tilt thing to allow (some) door access. They also make a ‘bent’ arm to fit round spare wheels.

http://www.maxxraxx.co.uk/

My mk1 Disco had a towbar which was set back in relation to the bigger than std spare wheel ounted on the rear door. Was still able to fit 2 bikes on my 9502 (I think) 2 bike rack easily as the ‘neck’ part of the rack is reasonably long.

pendle do a rack with offset arms to clear the spare

dont put the bikes on the spare , the mounts/hinges are not designed for the load.