Bicycle Mechanics - Need a bike stand

OK let's get one thing stated up front. I'm a cheap SOB! :D

I need to buy or build something for the garage to hold two bikes. I'm really getting tired of moving them around and/or knocking them over. :( I have a huge garage but I have too much crap in it and have no wall space. The ceiling is way too high to hang them. So I need something I can roll two bikes into easily. It also needs to be light enough that I can move it around in there if I need to. Anyone got any suggestions on a rack or a design that I could build myself? I have the tools and ability to build out of steel so that's probably what I'm looking at. Thanks for any ideas!! :)

ok, this is not out of steel, but that is what i made, b/c i can work with wood...

make a rectangle out of 2x4, the width of the rectangle should be just wide enough for you rear tire to fit in without touch both the front and the rear of the wheel. In the rectrangle nail into place more 2x4 spaced the proper distance apart for the rear tire of your bike (they will be closer for a road bike then a mountain bike, so i cant give you dementions. You can put your bikes at an angle to take up less space, but then the cutting and getting the proper distances becomes a little more difficult. (remember to have all the 2x4 laying with the 4 inch side being vertical) this is a cheap way to make a rear wheel stand

I've noticed that at my LBS they just use the large plastic-coated hooks designed to hang bikes in the garage. HOWEVER, they use them in an innovative way. Rather than screwing them to the ceiling they use one hook per bike screwed into the wall at a downward angle, probably about 45 degrees but probably not critical. They actually have them screwed into a 2x4 ripped with the appropriate angle, but that is probably not really necessary as long as there is room for the hooks to turn as you screwe them in. The hooks are place about 6 feet off the floor with the hook open to the side rather than up. Hanging a bike by it's rear wheel both tires rest on the wall. They have all their repair bikes hanging like this, maybe 40 bikes, and none has ever fallen despite the inevitable bumping. As far as I can tell as long as you have some downward angle to the hook, the exact angle and distance of the hook from the wall is probably irrelevant. Those hooks are only a couple of bucks apiece at Home Depot or Lowe's so you can't get much cheaper.

Forgive me if this is painfully obvious, but make sure you screw them into studs, not just drywall, and drill a pilot hole a little smaller than the screw threads at the selected angle before trying to screw the hooks in.

Well I finally finished a stand of my own design last night and I'm pretty darn proud of it. It's not perfect by any means, but it's VERY lightweight, fairly compact, and holds two bikes side by side. And best of all, it cost me next to nothing to build since I built it out of scrap I had laying around. It took me a couple of hours of "doodling" to figure out how I wanted to build it, and a couple of evenings of cutting, welding, and painting to finish it. Consists of just a base, and an upright with short "forks" welded in to hold the rear wheel upright. I'll post a picture if anyone is interested. :)

Parts List:
- 15 feet of 1/2"(correction...5/8") electrical conduit (neighbor gave it to me)
- 2 feet of 1/4" steel rod (found it in the scrap pile under my workbench)
- 1/2 can of blue spray paint (leftover from a "honey do" project a year or two ago)
- 3 feet of rubber tubing (cost me 90 cents at the hardware store)
:D

David: Pics, man, we must have some pics! :)

sure, pics would be cool.

later

O-TAY THEN!! Here it is!! :D

>>>A few more pics here if interested<<< (http://ecarthage.com/~nivens/bikerack/)

http://ecarthage.com/~nivens/bikerack/rack-cropped.jpg

Whatta ya think? Worth the 90 cents I spent??????? :D

Get a couple (per bike) of the 3/8" x 16 x 4" eye-bolts and screw into you ceiling joists. The fashion a pair of hooks from 1/4" aluminum rod the correct length to extend from the eye-bolts to the height at which you want to hang your bikes to keep them up and out of the way (I hung mine over the hood of my car, so they were pretty low but well out of the way). To prevent any marring of your wheels you can get a small can of liquid latex and dip the hook end of your newly make extension hooks in and let dry. Should cost you less than $25 for the pair of bikes. And is a better use of aluminum than to make bicycle frames out of.

That's pretty sweet. I really like the blue color. The two pronge thing in three locations appears to hold the bike VERY well.

How do you think the conduit will hold up over time?

L8R

Thanks dude, it works great so far. Yeah, I had that blue paint so I went ahead and used it....looks pretty good I think. I really think the conduit will be plenty strong. I tried to break the bottom welds loose so I could angle the upright part back a little bit but I couldn't break it...lol. So I just welded on the little braces at the bottom while holding it back about 1/4" where I wanted it to be. Notice how I attached the very top bar at an angle? That's because my wifes bike has taller tires. Just did that so both bikes would fit in the rack a little better. Could stand to be at even more of an angle but it'll be good enough. I'd probably put it together just slightly differently if I were doing it again just to make the tires fit a little better.

Got home last night and my wife was b!tching because I didn't make a place on it for her to hang her helmet. Soooooooo...... I'm adding an upright on one side with a couple of hooks on it so she(and I) will have a place to put her helmet...hehehe. :D I think some little rubber feet thingies on the bottom might also be in order to keep it from sliding around. No biggie but it's so lightweight that it slides around a bit when putting bikes on and off of it. Might get some plastic or chrome plugs for the open ends of the conduit too just to give it more of a finished look. It ain't much but it'll do for 90 cents. Better than using 2X4's :) Actually I could have saved 30 cents because I only used 2 feet of the rubber hose. :D HAHAHA.

What's the dia of the conduit. See if you end caps of your handlebars will fit. If so, go to your LBS, they usually have a box of hundreds of them.

I think Rubber feet would be a nice touch. Heck, If you cut some innertubes and stretch some over each end, that should be enough grip. Or, use some talc and spread the entire leg with an old tube.

I like it, I think I may have to fabricate a similar rack, but I've got to make it to hold multiple bikes. Between my wife and I we have 7 complete bikes (2 Road, 3 Mountain, a tandemn, and a BMX), and various frames in different states of dis-repair. Not to mention my buddies mtn bike he's storing, my neighbor's bike I'm fixing, and a beater-bike (Cruiser) I'm fixing up for my Secretary. Oh yeah, I'm also in the process of building up a SS mtn bike. So, that'll be a rack necessary for a dozen bikes. Any ideas?

L8R

Good idea but I think it's a little smaller than a handlebar. It's just slightly more than 1/2" ID. About .625" ID is what I measured with my calipers (whatever that is in fractions) - I'm sure I can come up with something that will fit the holes without blowing the budget too much. :D

You could build a double sided one that could easily hold more bikes and would not be much bigger. I thought about doing mine that way but really only needed room for two bikes.......at least for now. :D Only problem I see would be the smaller BMX tires. It's doable, just have to use your imagination. :)

5/8

Oh, yeah...

nice rack

;)

Originally posted by ChipRGW
5/8

Oh, yeah...

nice rack

;)


5/8" huh? ............. I knew that!!! :D hehehe

nice rack

I've been slapped before for saying this in mixed company!

L8R