VW Tailgate rack and Thule Towbar rack - simultaneous use?!

[Hohead]

We are a family of seven (five kids) with seven bikes to transport. I have searched everywhere trying to ascertain whether I could fit a Tailgate bike rack (to fit the larger 4 bikes) and a second bike carrier on the T6 towbar (to carry the three smallest bikes) to carry all seven bikes at once? (Obviously I am expecting to lose access to the boot while the bikes are mounted). Does anyone have any idea if this could work? I found one picture on the forum but with hardly any info. If it is possible, I’m especially interested to know the maximum height of the bottom bikes as well as if anyone has suggestions on the lowest lying towbar rack that I could try?


We moved recently from Cape Town where I had four of the bikes on Thule Pro-rides on the roof, and the other three on a Thule Hold-Fast carrier. But TBH, it was so much admin getting the bikes on and off the top of the van that it just killed the fun of going anywhere with bikes so we are trying to find an alternate solution.


I don’t think weight would be an issue (?!) because, except for my bike (Trek XL but quite light), everyone else rides adult medium (x2), adult small (x2) and two kids bikes - none of which are particularly heavy.

Any help much appreciated!

 

[Hohead]

Just bumping this up again wondering if anyone has any experience of this? Thanks a mil!

 

[Village]

Yes i do; i posted on here about it a few years ago. With a tow bar mounted thule rack i could only just fit 20" Isla bikes on the inner two racks; no room for anything bigger on the bottom deck, like so. So depends how big the kids bikes are i suppose as to whether they will fit, but i dont think you will get any combination of 3 of your bikes on there

 

[Hohead]

Thank you so much! Apologies I went dark on you.

 

[Village]

Well interestingly you can actually get 4 full size bikes on the boot rack! This is 3 x 27.5 and a 24, but actually would have been easier if the 24 had been full size. They need to be spread wide so the forks don’t clash with the rear triangle/caliper of the neighboring bike

 

[Hohead]

Well interestingly you can actually get 4 full size bikes on the boot rack! This is 3 x 27.5 and a 24, but actually would have been easier if the 24 had been full size. They need to be spread wide so the forks don’t clash with the rear triangle/caliper of the neighboring bike View attachment 259183

Is this just on the tailgate mounted Thule 4 bike rack? And then in theory, you could get another 3 small bikes below on a row at hitch rack? Or is that just asking for too much

 

[Village]

Is this just on the tailgate mounted Thule 4 bike rack? And then in theory, you could get another 3 small bikes below on a row at hitch rack? Or is that just asking for too much

Yeah that’s 4 just on the tailgate one. In theory you could get a few 20”s on the hitch rack too, although I vaguely recall that I had to close the tailgate and the hitch rack simultaneously to get the hitch ones to fit, and with 4 on the tailgate that is heavy, and probably not ideal for the hinges. So optimistic might be a fair description … but still possible I reckon

 

[Hohead]

Yeah that’s 4 just on the tailgate one. In theory you could get a few 20”s on the hitch rack too, although I vaguely recall that I had to close the tailgate and the hitch rack simultaneously to get the hitch ones to fit, and with 4 on the tailgate that is heavy, and probably not ideal for the hinges. So optimistic might be a fair description … but still possible I reckon

Great, thanks so much for the help. Really appreciate it