Thule 532 Vs. 591 ?

Gixermark

Hi Guys,

whats the consensus on the Thule bike carriers ?? specifically the difference between these two ?

i have used the 532 previously, and really had no issues/complaints.... the 591s are newer i guess - and look funky cos they look like a wave.. rather than straight...

price wise it seems the 591s are roughly 50% higher.. so there must be more to it than aesthetics ? i've read that 591s are easier to load ? i never struggled too much with 532s, but maybe the 591 is a fair bit easier ??

opinions welcome...

rokt

For me it would have to be the Atera Giro AF...

Cheaper, easy to use and very well made !!! I've had the Thule 591
and they are very nice but the Atera is better.

MikeWW

I wouldn't use either
Much prefer

1) In the car
2) On the back with a Thule 9503
3) Fork mounted on the roof with Thule 561

Gixermark

thanks.. will check out the altera..

i will have a towbar - so could go for one of the towbar mounted type carriers you get now - some of the thule ones look good, but the handy thing about the roof carriers are you can have them on there all the time... so no faffing/fitting and taking off again.

nicklouse

I use a Thule towbar mounted rack on the van but as the car can not take a towbar I have two 591 and a 561

rafletcher

Gixermark wrote:

thanks.. will check out the altera..

i will have a towbar - so could go for one of the towbar mounted type carriers you get now - some of the thule ones look good, but the handy thing about the roof carriers are you can have them on there all the time... so no faffing/fitting and taking off again.

And it's no issue fitting the tow ball mounted ones either...

nicklouse

and the rack.

giant_man

I like your van, what is that?

nicklouse

an Old T4 running on Veg Oil. with bed and TV etc...

giant_man

lol like it.

Gixermark

is firing the two bar mount ones on literally a minute job ? or faffing ??

is thule the one to go for it i went towbar mounted ? they seem pretty bloody expensive.. i will be fitting a tow bar regardless... but i got roof bars with the car i just bought..

I did like having the roof mounted system before for convenience - as i always left them on... but if the tow bar mounted jobs are a real quick fit/remove job i shouldn't discount them i guess..

when in the US you see cars with rear towbar mounted bike racks folded up out of the way.. do any of the ones here do that ?

do the tow bar mounted ones give enough room between the bikes to stop them rubbing ? i woudl be carrying everything from road bikes, TT bikes, mountain bikes (hard tail and full sus) and would ideally like the option of being able to carry the kids bikes if possible (but less important)

when carrying my carbon fibre Orbea beauty... i def. would not want it to be potentially rubbed by another bike... or any part of the bike rack... thats one thing i thought the roof mounted ones were good for - space between is plenty....

Gixermark

and yes - nice van/rack combo...... cool way to travel/stay and bike :-) nice work :-)

nicklouse

On the MTB side you can get issues with bikes with 150 rears. But you can usually offset them on the rack for clearance.

Takes less than 5 mins to put the rack on and bikes.