2-Bike Add-On for Kuat Piston Pro Bike Rack for 2" Hitches - Wheel Mount

Video Transcript for Kuat Piston Pro Bike Rack 2-Bike Add-On Review

Hey everyone, it's Evangeline here at etrailer and today we have the Kuat Piston Pro two bike add-on. This is gonna be the additional piece that allows you to transform your two bike Piston Pro into a four bike. Here in this video we are going to focus on our two bike add-on and stick around to see how easy it actually is to install. We're also gonna talk about what is involved with adding onto your bike rack, but if you are curious about the four bike Kuat Piston Pro, we do have it available here at etrailer.com as a full kit. And if you wanna check out all of those features, we do have a full review, which you can take a look at. With the ability to carry around more bikes you do also have to deal with more weight, more length, and more hassle.

So here there are some features that help out with having multiple bikes like the selective loading and unloading, but then there's also the downside of if you had the two bike version you have 67 pounds weight capacity per bike. But once you get the add-on you now have a 40 pound per bike weight capacity. Selective loading and unloading means that you can pick and choose which bike you need to take off. For example, maybe you're all carpooling to the trails and when you're ready to drop your friend off maybe their bike is this one second to the first. So what we're gonna do here is rather than take off all the other bikes to get to this one we'll just take off this single one.

So this uses pistons to disengage the wheel mount. So press that, we'll push this all the way down. We do have it slightly looser in the back. So what I'm gonna then going to is I'm going to lift our handlebars over the other handlebars, get those out of the way, make sure our seat looks good. And now we can continue to just take our bike off very carefully.

So we're dealing with pedals and chains and drivetrains but once we know what you're doing, you're then able to selectively unload this bike. And the reason selective unloading is helpful is because of how you should load up the bikes. While it might be more convenient to load their bike first and then the others last, what then happens is that you should have your heaviest bike closer to the vehicle and then the lightest bike furthest away from the vehicle. That will help a lot with that movement and making sure you're following that weight capacity. Now this will add more length as well, so measuring from the center of your hitch pin hole to the end of the bike rack, that's going to be 51 inches.

So depending on where your hitch receiver is, this will add a good amount of length to the back of your car. A major downside though is though you added onto the bike rack, you didn't add onto where the lever is to tilt it away. So it does help a lot to have a friend towards the end of the rack as you push down on this lever. And then that way they can tilt the rack down, be very careful because all that bike weight comes towards them. And then you can access your hatch, open up your trunk or lower your tailgate. With all that extra length, you do have a high chance of this touching the ground when it does tilt away. So just be careful as you lower it. And that might also affect your hatch clearance. So here with our Dodge Grand Caravan you can see how it just barely clears our handlebars but we still have that clearance to grab whatever we need whether it's our helmets, our bags, if we wanted to switch out our shoes and just hang out here in tailgate, we could do so. And if you fully load this up with 160 pounds worth of bikes that's also the weight you're gonna have to lift up to get into the ready to ride position. Now fortunately, it automatically snaps into place so you don't have to press anymore levers. The two bike add-on also includes the cable to lock your bikes, and this is gonna be the same length as your two bike cable lock that came with the original rack. So the thing with this is it's great that you'll be able to secure all four bikes. The downside is you may have a different set of lock cores. If you do want to fix that, you can get a set or pack of lock cores that needs to have at least three cores and then everything can be keyed alike. With this kit, you're going to have everything needed to install the add-on including the bolts as well as an extra tool. So let's take a look at that process. So to install your add-on you first start by removing the end cap off of your two bike rack and there's a little bit of assembly which we will skip over because you'll only have to do that the first time. And then adding and taking off the add-on will be very fast after that. With your included security hex wrench or tool you'll be able to loosen this bolt that is holding the end cap in. Now once that end cap is off, make sure to keep that piece because you'll put it on at the end of this install. Fit the two bike mast in and the tabs will hold it into place as you go over to the front and tighten down the two bolts. This still uses the same tool. On the mast there are letters which match the different trays. So find the matching tray and this fits into that tab. That way it stays into place without having to hold it up and then hold it as you put the nut on one side the bolt on the other, see it pop out right there. And then you're going to tighten that down. After all four trays are secure, you then finish it off by putting the end cap on. So just like how you took it off use the security side of your tool to thread it in. And that's it for the assembly. Moving forward, if you needed to take off the two bike add-on or put it back on, all you need to do is remove the end cap bolt as well as those two bolts on the inside. And that would take half the time it took to assemble everything. So much faster moving forwards. But that's it, you're ready to ride. So when dealing with bike racks that can carry around a lot of bikes it's always a major hassle getting everything lined up so that handlebars, pedals, and seat posts don't collide. The perks with this one though is because of this tray design, it actually made it easy. I had to do a little bit of moving things around but just because I could use these pistons for one touch wheel mounts, it made my life a lot simpler. So that is the perks to adding on your two bike trays to your current Piston Pro bike rack. Hopefully this video showed you how easy it may be for you to do, or if it's difficult to tilt things away then you can enlist your friends to help you out with that process. The different components of the Piston Pro series is also available here at etrailer whether you need just a single bike add-on, whether you need the two bike tray or if you want to upgrade to the Kuat Piston Pro X, you can find them all here on our website. But right here, right now this was a full review of the Kuat Piston Pro two bike add-on right here at etrailer.com. My name is Evangeline and I hope you enjoyed the journey.