Setting Up The New Bike Rack…

It’s the day after Thanksgiving. Mary and I spent the night at her youngest daughter’s home. I had planned to show some photos of our Thanksgiving in today’s Blog entry, but I forgot to bring my photo download cord. So instead I’ll present the Blog entry I had planned for tomorrow.

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Last Wednesday I temporarily attached the new bike rack to our Ford Bronco II. I attached one bike for this activity…

In the above photo the old bike rack is still attached as we had to bring back Mary’s bike from her youngest daughter’s home after Thanksgiving.

The whole purpose of this activity was to adjust the fold-down set bolt which locks in the angle that the fold-down arm is allowed to travel. This bolt is adjusted to allow the rear-mounted spare tire and rear door which lifts upward to just clear touching the closest bicycle in the fold-down position…

In this position we have access to the rear storage area of the Bronco without the bicycles laying on the ground. In preparation for my Monday morning departure, tomorrow I’ll mount both bicycles and cover them with our new bike-on-the-rack cover to keep them clean. Almost time to go!

All original material Copyright – Jim Jaillet 2011
For more information about my three books, click this link:
http://www.lulu.com/spotlight/panamaorbust

Our New Bike Rack And Cover Arrived…

late yesterday afternoon.

Both Mary and I have bicycles. I’ve long been dissatisfied with the bring-along storage arrangements. One was a hook-like hanger which attached to a rung on the ladder on the back of the motorhome. In general…it was a real pain in the butt both attaching and removing the bikes. Primarily because of the difficult-to-use securing device meant to keep the bikes from jumping off of the hanger on bumpy roads. That it did…but it also made it a pain to take the bike off for use in a timely manner. it was a real hassle!

The other bike rack we have attaches to the spare tire hanging off the back of our towed Ford Bronco II. This rack had trouble with the weight of the two bikes and wasn’t terribly stable.

So…we decided to try something new. A fold-down rack that attaches to the hitch receiver of the Bronco. Here’s the box it came in…

My primary concern with this rack is that it would work on the Bronco because of the rear-mounted spare tire. So…because it was cold outside…I used Mary’s living room to do a basic-assemble. That is…fit the pieces together without tightening the bolts.

I then took it out to the Bronco for a test fit. It’s going to fit…just missing the rear-mounted spare tire. If it wasn’t going to fit…that meant boxing the thing back up and returning it to the vendor. But…since it did fit…I brought the rack back into the house and tightened all the bolts. The fold-down action works by pulling the pin with the round finger-hole attachment. Today I’ll put it back on the Bronco with a bike attached and adjust the fold-down adjustment bolt which sets the degree of fold-down so that the bikes do not lay on the ground when you pull the pin.

As I have mentioned in numerous previous Blog entries…the road of life is a dusty and dirty one. The bicycles hanging on the back of either the motorhome or Bronco get very dirty. So to counter that element…we also bought a cover to put over the bikes. Here’s the box…

Hopefully this cover will help keep the bicycles cleaner. We’ll soon know if this new arrangement is going to work.

All original material Copyright – Jim Jaillet 2011
For more information about my three books, click this link:
http://www.lulu.com/spotlight/panamaorbust