Bike storage ideas

captainfirecat

Hi all

Pretty basic question, and I think I know the answer, but given whatever I do will be permanent I thought I'd ask here first!

I have a shed with 3 walls being brick. The back wall is longer than my bikes by a few inches; the other 2 walls are shorter by a good foot or two. As I have 3 bikes it is currently a pain to move the front 2 out to get the third, so I'm thinking bike rack on wall for 2 of them (mine) and let the wife's bike live where it is now on the floor. The height of the shed is plenty high enough.

So sturdy bike rack for 2 bikes, all good. Security wise, I put a ground anchor on the wall (a wall anchor!) and run my D lock and chain through that and the 2 bikes on the rack (bottom bike already has an anchor).

I see no flaw with the plan, but then I never do...

slowbike

I use an old tailgate bike rack in my garage - hooks on the wall and 2 bikes can sit on it quite happily. Leaves the space underneath for all the junk!
Only minor issue would be selecting the back bike from the rack - I've got one bike on long term storage (waiting to sell - Allez 56cm) on it so I've strapped it in to stop it moving and keep it clear of the other one so it doesn't really affect me.
For me it was a good way to utilise a bike rack that I otherwise wouldn't use.

captainfirecat

I was considering getting a generic tailgate rack if I couldn't find a 'purpose built' one, so good to know it would work just as well.

My plan was to put my nice race bike to the wall, D locked, and my scruffy cheap mountain bike in front of it, chained through the wall and the road bike. That seems to be the maximum inconvenience for a thief (and only a mild one for me, I'd have to lift a bike down, set it aside, get my actual bike, set it down and put the first bike back. How long before I gave in and put the good bike on the front...).

Ideally it would be road bike on ground and wife's and mountain bikes on rack, but she wouldn't be able to get the bike up there. I need to make sure I can site the wall anchor in a suitable place.

davis

Can you not do something like this along the back wall? Stagger the heights of the hooks so you get more room between the bars.

captainfirecat

What's amusing is I can't see how those are suspended (there's a hook on the front tyre of each right?)!

But my inability to spot things aside, the two issues I would have with that set up are it would be hard to secure all 3 bikes (I would need either a very long chain or 3 anchors. The shed door itself is barely relevant as it is light wood and would come apart with minimal effort) and the fact my wife would struggle to get her bike onto a hook (and I'm not always here to help her).

It would be much neater though, so it's a shame.

Thanks for all the suggestions btw, if there's a better way than my way I'm happy to be told it.

davis

CaptainFirecat wrote:

What's amusing is I can't see how those are suspended (there's a hook on the front tyre of each right?)!

They're levitating. They do that.
There's one of these for each bike and I just hook the front wheel on that.

But my inability to spot things aside, the two issues I would have with that set up are it would be hard to secure all 3 bikes (I would need either a very long chain or 3 anchors.

I use a separate anchor for each (valuable) bike. You can just about see one under the BB of the Giant MTB. I find it easier to have separate locks because I only want to unlock the bike I want to use... not faff about with a long cable/chain between all of them.

captainfirecat

Went to my local bike shop and tried to buy a rack but they dissuaded me and instead convinced me to buy a sort of hook thing that the peddle goes into. It does look like it will be neater than the rack, I'll see how it goes.

Next problem, drilling into bricks! Luckily I have lots of bricks to practice on first