Bicycle woes
/One thing that you learn fairly quickly when living and traveling in an RV is that things will definitely go wrong at times. If you have been following the blog, you know that we bought some used bicycles last winter when we were in Florida. Mine was fairly cheap, an older folding bike that actually fits easily in the trunk of my car. For Tim, we bought a recumbent trike and although it was used, it wasn’t cheap. We also paid to have it altered so that both the gear shift and the brake control were on the left side for Tim’s use. Tim spent time making a bike rack to carry it on the back of the fifth wheel using a metal tray that we already had. Initially it seemed like it worked well. Unfortunately, our good luck did not last.
The bikes we bought last year
The rack being built
On our travels back north in the Spring we had no issues with it for hauling the bike. Initially, we tried to haul the ladder on it as well but that didn’t work so well. Tim used wood and aluminum to support the bike and the ladder on the rack but the ladder must have moved so much that it bent the metal that was supporting it from hitting the trailer. Luckily it didn’t actually hit the trailer and when we realized it wasn’t working well, we moved the ladder to the back of the truck. There is definitely a lot of bouncing in the back of the fifth wheel as you travel!
The finished rack loaded with the bike and ladder. The setup looked very sturdy. Even though the ladder was tightly zip tied to the wood post and had an aluminum bar behind it, it moved so much that it bent the metal bar.
When we got back on the road in Fall, we thought the bike would continue to travel well in our rack. After a couple of stops, we noticed the rack seemed to be lower than it had been, but Tim thought it was still ok. The next time we traveled, I noticed the bike chain had broken and was dragging on the ground. Luckily I spotted it at a rest stop and we took the chain off and thought we were good. Boy were we wrong! The next time that we traveled, Tim was getting flagged from drivers that he had an issue with the bike rack dragging on the ground. We had to pull over on the interstate near Birmingham, AL to deal with the situation.
At our first stop in Ohio, the bicycle rack looked good and didn’t appear to have any issues.
I wish that I had thought to take pictures but in the heat of the moment, we were both thinking about dealing with the situation quickly so we could get off of that busy road. It was dangerous. Traffic was flying by us and there wasn’t much room on the side of the road. I had a couple of those bright orange vests in the truck in case we ever broke down so we wore those to make sure others saw us easily. It was a scary situation.
Tim managed to get the bike off of the rack and the rack off of the RV and then we had to figure out a way to haul it to our next destination. The only place that we could think to put it was on the bed. We covered the bed with an old blanket and he used ratchet straps to secure the rack and bike to the bed for traveling. It worked and we made it to our next stop without any more issues. When we inspected our hitch, we could see that the welds had broken on both sides so obviously it was overstressed due to the weight and bouncing when traveling,
We continued to travel that way until we got to our winter spot in Florida which wasn’t easy. We had to move the bike and rack out of the RV at each spot so we could use the bed then put it back when we traveled again. Luckily we only had a couple stops to go.
Unfortunately, the derailer on the bike was bent and we lost a couple parts. I am not sure if we lost them when the rack was dragging or when we were traveling after the incident. To get it easily in and out of the RV, we had taken some parts off and thought we had it all stored together but obviously that wasn’t the case. The first bike shop we visited here in Wildwood kept it for a week to assess it and then told us that they couldn’t get the parts to fix it. They referred us to a TerraTrike dealer in Inverness who thought they could fix it but the parts wouldn’t come in until mid February. The parts are still back ordered and now it looks like they won’t have the parts until mid April.
After thinking about how difficult it is to travel with this bike Tim decided that it is too much of a hassle. He was planning to sell it after it was repaired but since the parts now won’t be in until after we leave, he just sold it to the bike shop. They can then repair it and sell it. Unfortunately for us, we took a loss on the bike and now I have to ride by myself.
My little bike isn’t holding up so well either. When we bought it, the back brakes didn’t work well and it had issues shifting in to a couple of gears. We had those issues repaired initially and it seemed to work for awhile but I am having similar problems with the back brakes again. They work but you have to squeeze very firmly to get them to fully stop. It works well enough to ride in the RV park or a fairly level bike trail but I wouldn’t take it on a road. A couple of weeks ago, the back tire went flat when I was riding it and it was a total loss - the tire itself was shredded. We were just going to get rid of my bike too and not spend more money on it but Tim found some reasonably priced tires on Amazon so he fixed it for me. I am riding it again every day and will keep it until we get back to PA. I left a much better bicycle at my daughter Katie’s house and plan take it back from her. We put a hitch in the back of the car and will use that for a bike rack for me to carry it.
Tim hasn’t given up on using the back of the fifth wheel to haul something though. He recently had a fuel tank added to the back of the truck and now there isn’t room for his toolbox when we are pulling the fifth wheel. His plan is to get a much stronger rack built onto the back of the RV that is welded into the frame so he can carry the toolbox. We have an appointment in June to have some maintenance done at an RV shop that specializes in Forest River Cedar Creeks and he has asked them to fabricate this for him. In the meantime, we have to figure out how to travel there with the toolbox. Tim is hoping to redesign the existing rack that so we can haul the empty toolbox on the back of my car to get us back north. I really hope it works and we don’t have more issues when we start traveling again. Wish us luck!!
