Prius and roof racks
Created May 31, 2006, at 8:53 pm by Anonymous
We are considering buying a Prius, but would need to install roof racks for transporting bicycles. Anyone have experience with this? How significantly will roof racks - with bikes - increase fuel consumption?
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My 2003 Honda Civic Hybrid has a Yakima roof rack - see my blog here at http://www.hybridcars.com/blogs/hybrid-commuter/hybrid-carrying-kayak. Carrying a kayak on the roof rack definitely sucks down the mileage. Last time I looked a couple of years ago, neither Yakima or Thule made a roof rack for Priuses.
I've spoken to a couple who have a rear bicycle rack and they tell me they lose about 10-15 mpgs depending on how fast they're going.
The mpg decrease sounds like a lot, but they're still getting 35-40 mpgs, which is better than most vehicles without bike racks.
I have Yakima racks with Prius adapter mounting pads we purchased at REI. I normally get 50+ mpg on my daily 50 mile round-trip commute. When I put on the racks and take the bikes on vacation, my mileage drops to the mid-30's.
There are two factors as far as I can tell:
1) Open highway driving efficiency is lower than commuting in town.
2) The roof racks and mountain bikes create considerable drag.
The wind faring helps with the noise, but does not seem to improve the mileage.
This is still not chopped liver compared to other cars, such as our Camry, that tops out about 30mpg on the highway.
Does your mileage drop with just the yakima rack on (no bikes)? Do you have a fairing (if that makes a difference)? The reason I ask is that I would like to leave the roof rack on the car year-round for convenience. And is there any damage (permanent creasing/wear) to weatherstripping from the rack mount/clips?
The Prius was designed with very good aerodynamics, therefore, adding anything to it is likely to disrupt the airflow over the body, thus reducing the gas mileage. This will be much more noticeable at high speeds (greater than about 40 mph) Just driving with the windows down is going to cause a measurable affect at high speeds.
Putting any kind of rack on it will affect it and putting bikes will have a huge affect. I would be curious to see actual results from a careful test (same route/speed with and without racks or bikes) if anyone has done so.
If you care about your gas mileage, I recommend you remove the racks unless you actually need to haul the bikes.
Look, every car is aerodynamically designed to some extent so every car is going to get worse mileage with the addition of a roof rack or other external object that causes drag. Get over it prius drivers! My SUV mileage goes from 18 mpg to 12 pmg. Think about that when you whine about going down to 40mpg, waaaahhhh.
Lol, my Insight goes from 80 to 65 with my kayak.
Sucks for you Mr. SUV.
Am in the same place right now: I love to kayak and bike and sometimes (rarely)miss my old 18 MPG van with its ease of hauling.
Have been shopping online for roofracks that fit the Prius - anyone else have comments? Thule roofrack set (I don't think it even included straps) looked good, but was over $250.
What has worked for you?
I'm awaiting a Prius and the family bikes. On my SUV (that is sold thank God!) I had a trailer hitch that I installed to take a bike carrier that slid into the hitch. Don't think it killed my MPG that much as it was behind the bumper and much lower than the roof. My thought is to see if I can get a hitch on the Prius and use the bike rack off the hitch on the back of the Prius. How stupid or smart does that sound?
I have a 2006 Prius with a rear hitch bike rack. I lose 15 mpg on the highway when in use ( two bikes).
So KP, you actually installed an under the rear bumper trailer hitch set-up and then slipped the bike rack carrier into the hitch, right? Don't care that much 'bout the milage as I will only go 5 miles to the park...not like I'm carrying 4 bikes all the time.
Please clarify we are not talking roof rack or strap and sucktion cup stuff here.
Thanks!
You can find a hitch to put on your car @ http://somdsolar.com . Look in the prius section and you'll see a link to prius accessories. With the hitch you can put a rear mount bike rack on.
I too put a u-haul hitch on my 2008 Honda Civic Hybrid and carry a Thule 4-bike 1 1/4" bike rack. Yes mileage suffers but that's the sacrifice. My problem is that the car rides a little low. Anyone have any ideas how to fix this? So far I've found there are no air shocks or heavy duty springs I can replace what came with the car when I bought it.
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