Cloud Dancer wrote:
Immediately I was negative. Then, after thinking about it, I asked myself, what if it was my problem? I don't know.
Saw a minivan around town. Hanging off the hood had a bike rack designed to work on the trunk lid of a sedan. First thought, "What a idiot" A week later watched traffic ducking bicycles sliding behind a trailer. "What a rectum"
Naio wrote:
I don't want to get into personal details here, but I'm hauling stuff that isn't appropriate to have inside the vehicle. Nothing flammable, though.
On my previous van, I had a rear rack. but my new van has a different configuration, and a rear rack would be too far away from the rear axle.
I guess vans must be different from other RVs in this, but the difficulty I have is in keeping enough weight *forward*. It's easy to load up the rear axles and underload the front one. The front rack helps with that, a bit.
I'm still thinking over the point about a rear rack being dangerous for other drivers. I'm so used to being the only car within a mile of road that I didn't consider that.
Even with trucks, you will rarely see the front axle overloaded unless the rear is also over. RVs are no different, but most do not think about it.
As for safety of the rear mount. First, the load or carrier not secured. This should be obvious. Maybe you are perfect, will know when something falls off. But if you are driving along with no traffic in the mile in front of you are you expecting something laying in the road?
And then there is the problem of the weight that far behind the axle.
