Two (Bike) Hitch Rack Wall Mount

Sadly, I recently inherited my dad's single bike hitch rack (Thule). Meanwhile, I have a a 2 bike hitch rack, expandable to 3 (Yakima). While it's arguably overkill to have both racks, I ride often enough alone, and also with the wife on occasion that having both racks is not a bad thing. But what is a bad thing is storing them. They can be very tippy when on the floor resting on the hitch, and leaning on a wheel base--the Yakima's caused damage to my previous car when the dog knocked it over. So getting the racks up off the floor and secure was a huge goal.

I came across an interesting mount, that held two racks by simply sliding the mount through the hitch pin hole, then cantilevering the rest of it off another pin. It was pretty simple, and after ordering it, and the company essentially ghosting me, I decided it was spring time enough to tackle the problem myself.

The Hiccup

The Thule rack, utilizes a special hitch pin that is threaded and is bolted tight against the receiver, a special bolt can be purchased that allows the threaded hitch pin to be locked as well.

The Yakima rack however, has a quill style hitch attachment--a large screw, turned by hand via a large red handle, wedges against the hitches shaft--while it does have a spring ball safety pin that uses the receiving hitch pin hole, the rack's hitch pin hole itself does NOT go through the entire hitch shaft. So at this point the design I was copying would not work for the Yakima, so I would need to come up with a different way to support it.

PERSONAL PROTECTION

• safety glasses
• hearing protection
• gloves for the hot parts and for the burs.

MATERIALS

• 3' - 2" Telespar (Telescoping Square Tubing)
• 1 - 3/8" threaded rod, 2' long
• 7 - 3/8" bolt, 1" long (one with the bolt head ground down about 3/4 to 1/2 its height)
• 11 - 3/8" nuts
• 2 - 3/8" lock washer
• 2 - 3/8" lag bolts 4" long
• 1 - 1x4 10-12" long
• 2 - 3/8" wrenches (or 1 and a 3/8" socket and socket wrench)
• 4" piece of 1/2" PEX (optional)
• 1 - 1 x 6" about 9" long--for aesthetics mostly.

TOOLS

• 1 - file for deburring the cut Telespar
• 15/64 drill bit, pilot hole for the lag screws
• 3/8 drill bit, for pre-drilling 1 x 6
• drill
• angle grinder with a cutting wheel

I had two pieces of Telespar about 2' long. The Telespar is 2" square with 1/2" holes lined up and evenly spaced 1" apart.

I marked out halfway between the holes and cut two (2) pieces to 5" long, and one (1) piece to 7" long. In the end, it was three (3) 5" pieces--I go into that more later, so for two through pin holed racks, you would only need the two.

Using a speed square I roughly estimated the point between the two wholes and carried the line around to all four sides. Wearing safety glasses and hearing protection, I carefully scribed the line and began cutting around the bar.

For the 7" piece, I cut out 3 sides out to the next midpoint to leave a flange for lag bolting the mount to the wall.

After cutting, using the grinding wheel and a file I deburred the sharp edges and rounded up the corners a bit.

MOUNTING PINS

I cut two lengths of threaded rod to 8" and deburred the ends. Then placed them offset by one hole. Threaded a nut on one side, and a locking washer and nut on the other. I centered it up by eye, and threaded tight.

I stacked two of the 5" pieces on the 7" piece, just using the 3/8" - 1" bolts and nuts on the end holes and fastened as tightly as possible with two open ended wrenches.

I laid the mount onto a piece of 1 x 6, cut about 2" longer than the mount's height, and pilot drilled holes for the 3/8" hole the lag screw would go through.

I found the stud by using a large magnet. Holding the hitch rack upside down, I estimated a good height to keep it off the ground, then marked on the wall.

I placed the 1x6 on the wall, to center off the found height then drilled into the wall with 15/64" drill bit.

I put the lag through the mount, then throw the 1x6 and into the wall. I got it fairly snug, then used the level on my square to mark out the lower hole, and drilled that and tightened the lag as well.

At this point I was actually done.

I was done, and ready to mount the two racks. And as mentioned before: While the Yakima has a quill style hitch attachment--a large screw wedges against the hitches shaft--it does have a spring-ball safety pin that uses the hitch pin hole, the hitch pin hole itself does NOT go through the entire hitch shaft. So at this point I was a little defeated and deflated. I had to find a way to mount the Yakima. I slept on it, then realized I still had another 5" piece of Telespar and I could prob'ly use a bolt to make up for the different of 1-1/4" mount in the 2" telespar.

One of the cool things with the Telespar is the spacing which allowed for the attachment of the horizontal piece.

With two more 3/8", 1" bolts I attached, while in place on the wall, the horizontal piece.

I still wasn't out of the woods, as my hitch shafts are 1-1/4" and the Telespar opening is about 1-3/4". So taking the 3-sided piece i cut off from 7" piece, I made my own spacers (yeah, I could have used washers, but this was a concerted effort project to keep the hardware store runs to an absolute minimum of one!) With the bolt head, and the three segments it was a scratching tight fit.

I ended up grinding off maybe a 1/4 of the top of the head of the bolt. This ended up perfect. The hitch slides in easy and the bolt head keeps it in check.