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ao.frog

Well Known Member
Hi.

Anyone have pics of their two folding bikes inside the baggage compartment on a 7? Or a 6 or 9?

I found a few links etc when I searched the pages here on the forum, but found no pics of two bikes inside the plane.

Does two of the bikes Vans sells fit easily? How much space is left over for wife's bags for example? ;-)

Vans says on their website that two bikes will fit in a side-by-side RV, but it'd be nice to see and hear you folks experiences.
(it's a long and expensive way from Vans to Norway so it's nice to do the math before ordering....)

Thanks folks!
 
Its coming

I have discovered that if you cut the frames on two full size bikes they will both fit in the 7's baggage area.

I have just about finished the project, together with quick release cable etc..I just need to spend an afternoon re-rigging everything and test fitting them.

These were two old bikes I had..cost basically free plus some elbow grease.

Probably in a week or so I will have them complete.

Frank
 
folding bikes

My wife & I have two folding Dahon Mariner bikes that fit easily into our Grumman Yankee. We were disappointed to find that they would not go into the RV-7. Each bike is approx 12" x 23" x 32" folded. The RV-7 compartment that we were considering was only about 18" deep, so two bikes wouldn't go. Our bikes have 20" wheels and are quite pleasant to ride. Smaller bikes might fit, but the 20" wheels are considered the smallest you would go if you planned on riding any distance. -Regards, Bill
 
bike photo

I was able to borrow a bike from Kunstadt Sports here in Ottawa for a couple of hours. Brought it to the airport and tried fitting it in the RV-9A baggage area. It takes a bit of work, but you can fit it so it takes less than half the baggage compartment.

The problem is that in order to fit another bike, you need to have more room than what is available, just so you can maneuver it into position. If the baggage bulkhead, or portion of it were just a tad further back, then all this would work.

The bike you see in the photos, needs to be turned 90 degrees, and can then be brought out. You cannot just pull it out, since the seatback brace is in the way of the wheels.

By the way, this is with a Avenir 20" folding bike. It is Dahon rebranded product for Canada, and is similar to their other folding bikes.

As you can see, it was a no-go for us. Maybe a model that can have the handlebar shaft removable might work (but where do the brake/speed cables go?).

Bike3.jpg



Bike2.jpg



Bike1.jpg
 
2 non-folding bikes

OK, so I don't have folding bikes but if you build the -10 you don't need to fold them. Just simply pop the front wheel off and they fit perfectly.
We did three "bike and fly" trips this year (trip report coming) and it was a blast but I will watch this thread. Even though our regular bikes fit I would love to own two folding bikes. I rode one at Oshkosh and liked it but wanted to do more investigation. I sure would like to know what people have an like. It looks like wheel size is a big option and I think I would like a front derailleur so I had more options for gears. Ideally a foldable mountain bike would be great.

547026848_3tCGA-L.jpg
 
I can't prove it, because I only have one, but I am pretty confident that two Bromptons will fit easily in a 6/7 baggage compartment. If there is enough interest I will bring my Brompton to LOE and look for someone else to do the same. For one, I believe that Louise still has the one she got from Doug Reeves.

A Brompton is pretty well lost in that baggage compartment, but as has been pointed out, it is possible there may be a loading issue.

DSCN4184.jpg

Doug Reeves Photo​
 
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Bike Friday (Llama) fit in RV6

I have ridden Bike Fridays for years now, but only recently bought a flying RV6. One Pocket Llama fits easily. Two will fill it up. One Tandem XL fits nicely, with a little room for baggage left over.

The tandem is 50 pounds with tools and gearbags. The single bikes (Crusoe, Rocket, Llama) are all around 22-26 pounds each. For the singles, I take off the front tire and seat post. I also use removable pedals to slim down the width to about 10-11". For the tandem, remove horizontal tubes, both seat masts, and split both bars.

It's a bit of trouble and time, but fly-and-bike is fabulous and there are so many more places to visit when you can pedal 5-10 miles on your own instead of worrying about ground transportation.

NOTE on other folders: any folder with a hinge in the down-tube (like Dahon) causes the fold to place the front and rear axles end-to-end. This has a fundamental limit on the folded thickness (about 15"). For this reason and many others, I like the Bike Friday fold (near bottom bracket) the best.

G.
 
I agree with many before.
I can fit my eBay purchased folding bike but it becomes problematic when attempting to fit the 2nd. Although, I believe there is enough room to fit both.
 
Need more space?

The RV-10 cargo pod holds a couple full-size bicycles... or a 250cc motorcycle if you don't like to pedal. There's even a built-in winch system so you can attach/remove it in under 60 seconds.





Maybe I can sketch up a smaller pod for the RV-6 and 7. It should make it easy to carry folding bicycles, golf clubs or skis. Is there anything else you guys would like to carry? How about a pod with an aux fuel tank? What do you think a reasonable price would be?
 
pod on RV6

I have thought about this ever since seeing your product. Very tempting.
I even thought about hard-points under the wings for pods there.

Quick thoughts:

The problem is weight. The RV6 just doesn't perform all that well when 200-300 more pounds are bolted on to it. That said, if it was right at CG, it sure would be the best possible way.

The belly pod or wing pods would have to add no more than 10-20 pounds TOPS or not worth it. A capacity of 80-100 would be good. Easily installed/removed of course.

More tankage? Interesting. More of a plumbing issue than anything else, once you pack the weight.

Prices?
No-brainer $1500-2000
Maybe $2500-3500
"That's nice, wonder who owns one" $4000 up

How's sales on the RV10 unit? Popular? Once-in-a-while?

G.
 
I saw David's product first hand at S&F. I tried to help him but I was just in the way. He had the pod dropped and the bike set up in minutes.

It's hard to think a bike fits with room to spare in his, as a volunteer called it, "Baby Caravan".
 
loading

Canopy is in the way a bit. I did not like the Meske or JRW mods, not enough clearance. Got my own ideas but no time.

Biggest issue is CG for me. Need to load farther forward than the baggage bay.

Next biggest issue is gross weight. Sluggish at 1900# for sure.

G.
 
born2fly said:
The problem is weight.
G.
Click to expand...

Your right. A pod might not be very useful if the airplane doesn't have a lot of useful load. Maybe we'll stick to the 4-seaters. Perhaps a folding bicycle would fit nicer if the baggage compartment was extended just a little?

We sold our first couple RV-10 pods and there are several other orders firming up. That's, not a bad start... considering there are only a couple hundred examples flying. We've got them on 1% of the fleet and I expect that to grow to between 2 and 5%. Our real market will be STC'd pods for more numerous production aircraft. For example; 2-5% of Cessna 182's would be 400-1,000 pods. The RV-10 was an easier place to start because we were able to get the product developed and into production without certification.

We recently sold my demo airplane and I just received an E-mail from the new owner. He's at the Grand Canyon this week with a pair of mountain bikes in his pod. We're building him a new motorcycle which he plans to use regularly for transportation and adventures... I'm starting to miss the airplane now!

-David
 
Here's pics of 2 bikes in an unmodified 7...

http://www.vansairforce.com/community/showthread.php?t=55696&highlight=rv7+bike

...in this thread that I started after reading on the forum. I missed this particular thread during my first searches. In fact, when I just now searched for the thread I listed above, the search words that I used, which were contained in the title, yielded no results. The bikes ride fine, and are inexpensive. Lots more details on the thread link.
 
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