Hey,
I just recently picked up a '90 4Runner as my daily driver and am interested in putting a couple mountain bikes on it once the weather improves. I have a set of yakima bike racks (were roof mounted on cross-bars on my subaru). I'm interested to see what most people do wrt to carrying bikes on the 2nd gen 4Runner... especially the early models.
From what I can tell, the early 4Runners just had a "luggage rack" (rails hurring the length of the car, not across) that is not capable of supporting much weight and i'll need to mount a 3-rd party (thule/yakima/etc) rack to actually put something useful up there...

Looks like my options are:
- Get Thule/Yakima landing-pads/feet for the luggage rails and getting a whole new set of crossbars and mount my yakima bike racks/rails to that ($180-200 looks like).... though this is a whole roof-rack system you can mount other stuff to and is pretty versatile, though max 100lbs.
- Thule/Yakima gutter-mount feet & crossbars... and just a regular rack like on other cars, forgetting the luggage rails on the truck completely.
- Some spare-tire mounted 2-bike rack, mounts to the back of the truck via the spare tire carrier, swings away with the spare tire... (i assume the carrier can take the extra load of a bike)
- A hitch-mounted rack...

Later 2nd gen 4Runners actually had a rack with cross-bars... is there a way to get this somewhere? and mount it up to my truck? Is that even worth it? or do I just go with some Thule/Yakima solution?

BTW, I love my 4Runner!!!... already have a long list of little mods I'd like to do, especially fix the slightly saggy rear end... it won't win any races, but I'm having fun with it so far.

~luke
Seattle, WA

 

As a cyclist and a traveling bike racer I have been very happy with my 4 bike hitch rack. The one I have has arms that fold down so I just leave it on 365 days a year. I wouldn't recomned the roof rack for several reasons: 1. gas milage 2. Dificuly to put bikes up there 3. They are more likely to be damaged from garages, tree branches and the like. The only draw back is that they don't work as well for certain frames.

 

Pic:

 

Something doesn't look right with that bike! Can't put my finger on it.

 

Another vote for the hitch rack. They may not look as cool as roof racks, but they sure are functional.

 

Do you need a bike rack for that wheel??:pat:

 

I have a Bauer swing-a-way style rear hitch bike rack and love it. I take my bikes up to Mammoth every year and fill the back of my truck with my 2 dogs and all my junk. The swing-a-way style enables you to leave the bikes on the rack and still open the the tailgate.

 

I aslo heard the swing-a-way bike rack from Hollywood Racks is good.

 

Yea, the swingers are nice for road trips. They are usually spendy though.

 

I always like this guy's thread:
https://www.yotatech.com/forums/show...ke+performance



...and somewhat influenced by this thread this is my end result:

 

A few very old pics of my rig.
I have the Yakima crossbars on Q Towers, and a Lock Jaw for the fist pic, and A Copper Head I think it is called for the 2nd pic.

http://www.toyotaoffroad.net/tando/b...mp/lockjaw.jpg

http://www.toyotaoffroad.net/tando/bike_temp/bike2.jpg

 

I've seen someone clean a bike off their 4runner with a tree-snapped the dropouts right off the fork, and I don't know what else. Not pretty. We put ours inside as in the pic above, except that we bungee them to handles on the inside of the roof and lock em up at night to the seat brackets, just in case. Keeps em dry and clean (an old sheet will protect your carpet), and the price is nice

 

Just measured. There is no way an adult sized bicycle will fit in the back of a 4Runner without taking the seat post off every time. So much for that idea.