Rack mounting options for a Prius
 

I just picked up a 2011 prius and didn't even think about it until now, but I don't think my Saris Bones 3 will work since the hatchback is glass.

Any recommendations?

There is a bolt-on hitch kit available for the Prius that you can bolt onto the bottom of the body. I think there are some tie-downs that you remove to put this thing on. Then you can use a normal hitch mount.

Note this does not mean you can now pull a 28' camping trailer (or any trailer, really) with the Prius. It's made specifically for a hitch rack.

It'll also cut your mileage by 20% or so.

How does it do that?

Any rack on any car will cause a drop in mileage due to increased air resistance and more tubulent airflow off the back of the car. (No idea about the 20% figure quoted for the Prius.)

I own a 2009 Prius.

I also had the Bones rack, and you do not want to put 3 bikes on it. I did. The arms that rest against the glass come off the glass and hang there, with the rack only being held onto the car by the straps. If you look on the Saris website the Bones rack is not recommended for the Prius.

They sell sell other strap-style racks for the Prius though.

You can get a 1.25" hitch installed on the Prius at UHaul. From my research the UHaul hitch (I think it's made by Curt) had a good reputation for reliability, at the time another company called Coastal also made a hitch rack but it had a terrible reputation (I think they stopped making it). At the time I could not find a 2" hitch for the Prius, though since then I've seen them online that claim to be class 3, but...I'm a little dubious about how they could actually accomplish that.

The nicer thing about my hitch rack is that the bikes don't bump against the bumper on the car, and I can lift the hatch with the rack on, or even with the bikes on the rack (I have a Saris Cycle-On rack).

The drawbacks of a hitch rack are -
1. I tried 3 hitch racks and none of them hold to my car 100% steady like my strap style rack did.
2. They're more expensive than the strap style racks.
3. "Hold by the wheel" style racks - if you just put it on your car and leave it on it's fine. But they're more work to take on and off the car. Also, I have a garage, but before that I live in an apartment and I wanted the "hold by the wheel" style of rack - they are waaaay heavier and bulkier than the strap style racks, would not have wanted to take the rack on and off my car and back and forth between my apartment all the time. Whereas the strap style rack would just fit in the trunk. I think some might be better than others, but my Saris Cycle-On is heavy and huge.
4. You can get a 4-bike "hold by the frame" style rack for the Prius. But you cannot get a 4 bike "hold by the wheel" rack for the Prius because anything that carries 4 bikes in that style of rack requires a Class 3, 2" hitch. Note that this applies to almost all small and midsize cars as they're not rated to have a 2" class 3 hitch installed on them.
5. I bike in the winter so I leave my rack on the car in the winter, and the hitch racks are generally made out of steel and start to rust, and my "hold by the wheel" style of rack collects some of the road grime that's kicked up by the rear wheel. Whereas my strap style rack was higher up and made out of plastic and this was all a non-issue.

I've probably written way to much, lol. Basically you have 3 choices -
1. A different strap-style rack designed for hatchback geometry (there's plenty of choices out there)
2. A hitch rack
3. A roof rack

As for fuel economy, I think the other poster in confusing hitch racks with roof racks. Roof racks on the Prius (well - actually on most other cars to) have a reputation for reducing mpg by 2-3 with just the rack on there, and noticeably reducing it with a roof rack plus bikes. The bikes end up pointing right into the wind and create wind resistance.

A rack on the back of the car doesn't seem to affect fuel economy by any noticeable amount. I watched it when I got my hitch rack, and was surprised to find that just the rack with no bikes made no noticeable difference , and surprisingly I didn't even see a difference in fuel economy when I was driving with the back on it.

The only racks I know of that reduce fuel economy are the roof racks. (I mean I imagine driving with the bikes on the back must reduce fuel economy by something, but it wasn't enough for me to be able to tell while watching the fuel economy reading).

Well, let me just say my Prius usually gets 50 mph on the highway. The last time I did a road trip with a bike on the hitch rack, I filled up shortly after starting the return leg, and it got 35 mph coming home. I discount 5 mpg or so for the headwind, and come up with a 20% drop in mileage.

Since then the children moved away, so I can usually lay the bike in the back.

With respect, that's not a very good test with fudging numbers and guessing. I'm just saying that on mine, I haven't scientifically tested it, but I *definitely* would have noticed a 20% drop in mileage and that hasn't happened, I would often reset the mileage meter on my way home with my bike on the rack and I'd still get the same numbers as usual. There's a certain margin of error in there...but not 20%, I undoubtedly would have noticed that.

Wow, that's a lot. I just put a hitch and hitch rack on my Civic sedan last week (after using a trunk mount). I don't do much highway driving, so I can't say how it has affected mileage, although I'm sure the 40 pounds of hitch/carrier and 30 pounds of bike hanging off the back cause a significant hit, in addition to any aerodynamic issues. I'm hoping effects will be minimal with no bike on the carrier.

Heck, my wife has a Prius and we can fit two bikes in the back with the seats down. Problem solved- no need for an external rack!

lol, do you know how much your car weighs? Around 3,000 pounds. 70 pounds is 2.3% of the total body weight. Or to put it another way, that's less than half the weight of having a 2nd guy ride in the car. Plus if you read the road biking forums, the general sentiment is that bike weight doesn't affect your speed or effort once you're up to speed on the flat, it's just when accelerating or going uphill that it matters, one might think the same thing would apply in a car...

lol, yeah, but to be fair I bet it takes some effort, fitting it in at the right angle, and laying one bike on top of the other with the rear seats down. At least it does on my own Prius... :D Not that it isn't cool that it's possible... :-)

I'm an engineering type by trade, and I'm pretty sure from my memory of college physics that they are wrong on that, for both bikes and cars. It's not weight, it's mass, and friction, wind resistance, and other losses due to gravity mean increased energy requirements to stay at a steady speed on a flat with increased mass. It takes a given amount of energy to propel a particular mass at a particular speed, and increasing the mass mean you have to increase the energy input. Try pulling a 2,000 pound trailer with your bike and then tell me the added mass doesn’t mean you have to work harder just to maintain a speed on level ground.

Yeah, I can get my 26" mtb in the back of the Civic, but I have to remove the front wheel and the seat post. I'm not even gonna try to get my 29er in the back.

Yeah, that was pretty badly worded... I was after something a little more specific and some methodology. :-)

The Saris Bones RS rack fits on almost anything and I have been able to install mine in less than a minute on every vehicle I've tried. Check their website to see if it will work on your Prius.

Aerodynamic drag force increases by the square of the velocity. The Prius is pretty aerodynamic which helps it achieve it's good mileage at highway speeds (50mph+), and hanging a rack with a bike or two on it will definitely affect your highway mileage. In town, not so much.

We went with a Curt Hitch on our Scion XB and bought a two bike rack for it. It's nice not having anything touching the paint! Since then, we have purchased a tandem and bought a second rack for hauling the long bike.

http://i497.photobucket.com/albums/r...B/DSCN1695.jpg

http://i497.photobucket.com/albums/r...B/Photo5-1.jpg

Looks like that tandem is wider than the vehicle

It's no wider than pulling a utility trailer. It is but not as bad as it looks in the picture. I have gone through my banks ATM driveup without any problems.

use a hitch, i have an 2004 prius, ill post pix later