The Automaxi Allroad 4 tow-bar cycle carrier, supplied by Mont Blanc, is the ideal way to carry four bikes on the rear of your vehicle and takes the hassle out of transporting four bikes.
The light-weight bike carrier is easy to fit and clamps onto a rectangular aluminium casing which sits on the ball. With only a small amount of assembly required, all the tools you need are included in the box. Also included is a combined lighting board and number plate holder.
Unlike some four bike tow bar cycle racks currently on the market the Allroad 4 will lock directly onto the tow-ball and will fit onto detachable, swan neck and flange tow-balls.
The adjustable wheel holders will hold tyres up to 6.5cm and individual frame
spacers ensure that the bikes are stable and do not come into contact with your other bikes.
With all of these great selling points in mind myself and my colleague Angela decided to try it for ourselves and test the features and benefits. So, on one of the hottest days of the year, we took it for a test drive.
The cycle carrier comes out of the box almost fully assembled, all we needed to do was secure a couple of brackets for the support frame to attach to and screw on the lighting board. We were then ready to put it onto the tow ball.
In order to attach the bike carrier to the ball an aluminium locating block is used. The block sits around the ball and the cycle carrier can be simply lifted on. Once in place the two bolts surrounding the block need to be tightened to the correct tension so that the bike rack is secure.
The lighting board has a 7 pin electric plug, which we plugged directly into our socket.
There were also two straps, which are used to support the carrier which we attached to the top of the boot lid.
We were now ready to load on our bikes; using two mountain bikes and two racing bikes. We
lifted the first bike on and sat the wheels in the adjustable plastic wheel holders. The straps are
threaded around the wheel holder in varying positions depending on the length of the
bike, as the Allroad 4 is also suitable for child bikes. The straps then needed to be wrapped
around the wheel and secured using the cam buckle. Once all bikes were on, we re-tightened all of
the cam buckles to ensure they were secure.
The bike frames also needed to be secured to the cycle rack. To do this we used the supplied cam buckle strap to attach all of the bike frames to the main support frame.
We then used the two frame spacers between bikes two and three and bikes three and four. The
spacers prevent the bikes coming in contact with each other when they are being transported. These
supports are made of rubber so they do not damage the frame of the bike.
Once again we checked the tension on all of our straps. We checked that our lights were working correctly and that the number plate was secure. We were ready to go!
We drove to a nearby canal to take some pictures of the cycle carrier in action, the journey
went well. Despite the extra weight the handling of the car was unchanged. We were even
confronted with a few speed bumps but the cycle rack was fine.
One of the features of the carrier is that it is tilt-able and allows access to the boot when the bikes are attached which we were keen to test out. We removed the straps which were attached to the boot and undone the hand wheels which allow the bike rack to tilt. Once these are undone the cycle carrier and bikes can be tilted down which allows full access to the boot. As demonstrated, very gracefully, by me:
We were really impressed with the design of the Allroad 4 bike carrier. It was easy to assemble, easy to use, extremely light weight and the perfect way to carry four bikes on your car.
