We travel with our bikes on every trip. When we got our new tow vehicle we decided to move them from the bed to the trailer tongue. On our Nissan Frontier we used the Swagman fork mount and put the bikes in the truck bed. This worked really well, but took up a ton of room that we could have used for other things. So, with the higher towing capacity and tongue weight rating of our Colorado Diesel, we decided to go with the Jack-It.
It looks pretty scary having the bikes up high like that but they stay pretty stable. I know since even when I’m towing I’m always checking the rear view mirror – so I’m looking at them a lot.
Net-net we’re happy with the Jack-It, but I’m not sure that I’ll still be able to get the bikes up there in another 10 years. Time will tell.
Pros
We’re using room that isn’t otherwise used
The rack is very good quality
Cons
It takes a lot of upper body strength to get the bikes in place. If you, or you and your travel partner can’t lift the bikes over your head, you can’t use this rack.
If you store your trailer on a hill (like we do) you have to pull the bikes before you park it. Otherwise they’re just too high to get to.
It isn’t easy getting them on and off without hitting the front of your trailer. If you’re careful its fine, but it is a bit of work.
If you want to rotate your power jack head so it doesn’t interfere with the bed gate, you can’t do that and use the Jack-It.
It’s amazing how many paper towels we go through on a camping trip. We put one of these holders outside and one inside. They have a “clicky” movement so the towel roll doesn’t move unless you really mean it to. This is great for dealing with road vibration. Note: I installed these with the screws…
I’m old. I lean on things. I happened to lean on the outdoor socket on my 215RBK when I stood up from placing the X-Chocks and it moved. A lot. I realized that they were using the foam on the outlet cover to seal the giant hole in the side of the trailer. And since…
There were several surprising things about the outdoor kitchen. There are 4 large holes in the back of the kitchen and a few small ones that are superhighways for critters. On nice days we tend to leave the door open so this had to be fixed. Coleman generally makes good products but the included grill…
We’re really happy with our Coachmen Apex 215RBK but there are a few design flaws. Early this summer we discovered one of the biggest.
Almost no cold air from the AC gets past the entertainment center into the bedroom!!! This made for a very hot night until my wife figured out if we rotated the TV 90 degrees so it sat between our feet then the air could get through. This was a genius work around.
