Car mounted bike rack question

[luv2fly]

I just got a bike rack for my car (Saris Guardian); my question to those of you who have bike racks on your car, do you remove it after you get home and put it away? In other words, do you leave it on your car for extended periods even when you're not transporting bikes? It would be less hassle to do that, but at the same time I'm worried about it getting stolen.

Your thoughts? Thanks!

~ Laurie

[Thorn]

We take it off. A couple of reasons....we drive a Prius and the Prius hates anything that gets in the way of its aerodynamics. Thus, even an empty rack can bring down our gas mileage (picky, picky car).

But, DH is a worrier and would need to adjust all the straps every time the bikes go on--so might as well just do it from scratch every time.

And, then, now that we've had the rack for a couple of years, it takes longer to gather up all of the bike "stuff" than it does to pop the rack on and off.

Just my 2cents.

[mimitabby]

it's definitely best to take it off for gas mileage reasons, but we've left ours on before... laziness?

[LBTC]

We left ours on the roof all winter, even, because we never got around to taking it off. Definitely impacted our gas mileage, but we drive infrequently and short distances, so we don't feel that too intensely. On the other hand, it also allowed us to meet some friends - when DH had the winter tires swapped for the summers at the tire shop, our new friend ran over to ask him what types of bikes we ride - they are actually our neighbours, our backyards are just a few yards away from each other! And, DH raced with him as his partner, in a 6 hour race this year, and she did my testing and is prescribing my homeopathic remedies.

I'd say it worked out very nicely being lazy with the racks this year. Naturally, your mileage may vary.

Hugs and butterflies,
~T~

[luv2fly]

Thanks everyone, for the info :-)

Yeah, I guess it's one part laziness on my part - for instance, I'm working midnites tonight (7p-7a), and when I get home tomorrow morning, I want to just throw the bike on the rack and take it to the local park... without having to also re-hook the rack back up. As for mileage, I don't drive too far to work (20 minutes) and my little Toyota Yaris gets 40mpg... :-) I guess the solution will be to leave it on if I know I'm going to use it again in a day/two... but take it off if it's going to be longer than that.

[susiej]

I've left my trunk rack on my car for months on end, and not had a problem, even in the city.

However, someone stole the (much more expensive) hitch mount rack off my husband's car when it was parked in our drive. We weren't too surprised, because years before someone had tried to peel the month-year sticker off my license plate.

[Tuckervill]

You can buy a locking pin for your hitch mounted rack, which will prevent anyone without a hack saw from getting it off.

Karen