penquissciguy

I spent the last month or so investigating the options for extending family bike trips with our four year old son. He's riding his own bike at this point, but riding unaided anywhere other than our driveway is beyond his skills as of yet. We looked into trail-a-bike type bicycles, but they were well out of our price range. We then came across the Trail Gator. This bar that connects adult and kid bikes was more reasonably priced, and looked like it would fit our needs well. It arrived from Nashbar today and was installed in about an hour by my wife. Here's some thoughts after a (brief) test ride:

* The four year old LOVES IT. He feels very secure and comfortable being towed, and now wants to ride all over town.

* Dad loves it too. Having my son in tow behind my mountain bike makes little difference in how the bike handles. I had no issues turning or braking.

* Mom loves it because we all can go riding together. We already had a bike seat for our other child, who is 17 months old. We needed a way to make sure our older child could keep up and stay safe, and the Trail Gator works well for us in those respects.

If you're looking in this product market, this might work for you.

Ken

Grasschopper

How easy is the connect and disconnect from the child's bike? I have a trailer bike but I have found that we go on rides together and my son doesn't get a lot of time to ride his 2 wheeler (with training wheels currently). I was thinking of getting one of these so that we can ride to a park or a friend's house and he can ride his bike there seperated from my bike.

Also how is the seating position on the bike? I would think the child would be a bit tilted back due to picking up the front of the bike.

penquissciguy

Once you have the mounting brackets on the bikes, it takes maybe 5 minutes to connect. There's a quick release on each end of the tow bar and a hitch pin that needs to be removed and repositioned (allows the bar to be shortened for storage).

Ride angle seems fine. We took a six mile ride with the 4 year old in tow the other day and he loved it. The tire only ends up 1-2" off the ground, so it's not that big a difference.

Ken

Hambone

you dont' ride the 17mo and the 4yo both off of your bike do you? (I was wondering about that for my two boys. Mom is too nervous a rider for me to get her to take on a second...)