Bests & Worsts Reviews from Amazon

After reading a bunch of the positive reviews, I bought this rack to carry five of my bicycles on a cross country trip from VT to TX. The rack shipped quickly and was easy to assemble. It seemed very sturdy, and stable but a lot of the other comments were also true. Putting socks or something else on the bike closest to your vehicle is a good idea because it actually rubs against the vehicle. Once the rack is loaded with bikes you actually will need a hammer to remove the locking pin to allow the rack to drop down and open your trunk. I didn't have a hammer the only time I attempted it so I gave up. I also added extra tie downs to keep the bikes together so they wouldn't swing in and out. I headed out on the trip and checked on the rack at every fuel stop and everything stayed secure. Day two of the trip, heading down I71 south out of Cincinnati, just into KY we were signaled by several other drivers. The rack had fallen off. The two bolts at the bottom had sheared off dropping the rack in the center lane of the interstate. Luckily the drivers behind us were able to dodge the sudden tumbling mass of metal. Because of the extra straps I had added the bikes stayed together and didn't fly everywhere. The rack wasn't damaged (except for the missing bolts) but the bikes were wrecked. We contacted Allen Sports and they basically told us it shouldn't have failed but they weren't going to do anything. To be clear the rack wasn't overloaded, there was two adult bikes, and three kids bikes but none of them were over 35lbs. Unfortunately the adult bikes were both Trek road bikes and cost about $500 each when we bought them 4 years ago. I strongly discourage anyone from purchasing this rack, you don't want to be responsible for causing a fatal auto accident when the bolts break and it falls into the road.