Motorcycle Trailer Hitch - what are the straps secured to?
For a long time I have wanted to take my XSR 900 to a track day. But I needed a way to get it to the track. I found this and want to get some feedback. I know a trailer would be better, but I would not have anyone to assist me in getting it up the ramp. I attached a pic of a guy who has a solution for the bike leaning into turns. He uses ratchet straps. But what is he securing the straps to on the bumper? I have a Honda Accord so it does not have anything natively to attach the straps to the bumper.
Last edited by Peter Aawen; 01-14-2023 at 06:06 PM.
Reason: why - way; bile - bike; racket - ratchet; & expanded title to briefly ask the question. ;-)
Get a trailer and be done with it. I built one for myself years ago and didn't like it. I let more people borrow it than I ever used it. It gave me a spooky feeling every time I used it.
Well, I reckon you have already answered your question.
Trailer every time. Get a 3 bike jobbie and maybe go with some mates for a day out. Pop an extinction on it and take ya Spyder for a drive. Pop a crate on it and use as a normal trailer with sides.
What could possibly go wrong.
Last edited by Isopedella; 01-14-2023 at 05:42 PM.
Be aware that towing the bike with the rear wheel on the ground, but engine off transmission in neutral can severely damage your transmission. I would remove the drive chain as a precaution before using this sketchy tow rig.
2021 Spyder RTL chalk/black/chrome bought in March 21. Previous rides: 2019 Spyder RTL, Orange/chrome. 2015 Harley Heritage, 2002 Harley Heritage, 77 Harley Electra Glide, 75 Harley Electra Glide, 72 Harley Sportster (first bike bought new)
My Spyder Mods
Rider backrest, F&R cup holders; F3 handlebars; BRP LED driving light; LaMonster front fender and mirror turn signals, LaMonster Saddlebag lights, Auxito LED rear turn signal blubs w/ built in load resistor; Brake lite modulator/flasher; LaMonster flags on trunk; Garmin Zumo XT. LaMonster Bluetooth adapter for Phone & GPS through Spyder speakers. LaMonster floorboard risers; FOBO tire pressure monitors, Vredestein front and rear tires; BajaRon sway bar.
Be aware that towing the bike with the rear wheel on the ground, but engine off transmission in neutral can severely damage your transmission. I would remove the drive chain as a precaution before using this sketchy tow rig.
For a long time I have wanted to take my XSR 900 to a track day. But I needed a way to get it to the track. I found this and want to get some feedback. I know a trailer would be better, but I would not have anyone to assist me in getting it up the ramp. I attached a pic of a guy who has a solution for the bike leaning into turns. He uses ratchet straps. But what is he securing the straps to on the bumper? I have a Honda Accord so it does not have anything natively to attach the straps to the bumper.
Buy a trailer with a full floor and a tailgate ramp instead of just using wheel width ramps, fit it with proper bike tie-downs and then just ride your bike onto it - or at least walk it on safely. That way you won't need anyone to help get your bike onto the trailer!?!
Do that, and your car's bumper/rear frame/body will last longer; your car's rear springs will last longer/work better; your car will steer & drive with some modicum of normality & safety; your bike will last longer; you won't destroy expensive bike tires &/or chains/belts/gearbox/clutch internals anywhere near as much/often as that thing will; and you have the added advantage of being able to use the trailer for other things besides, like trailering your mate's bikes too, or your Spyder, or transporting other stuff!
Things like that shown are gimmicks that are more aimed at relieving you of your hard-earned $$ than they are designed to work as you might think they were intended! Mind you, they do tend to keep the bike recovery &/or repair places in business, if not also putting more $$ in the pockets of the bike sales places when you need to replace your bike after one of those monstrosities has either worn the back end of the bike's driveline out prematurely or worse, mangled the whole thing into a twisted scrap of metal shards bouncing along behind your car & ripping the crap outta it's bumper & rear end/frame too, all before you could bring it all safely to stop! Oh, and my contacts in the Insurance industry love them as perfect reasons for disallowing damage claims to either/both the tow vehicle & the bike too - often just as 'not fit for purpose' tow items, but maybe your insurers over there are more gullible?!
If you want to do it, why not do it properly instead of trying all sorts of cheap-arsed shortcuts like this one?! Buy quality, fit for purpose items, and cry once (at the initial price maybe?); or buy cheap-arsed crap and cry often, every time you find something else broken or you hafta buy another bike &/or some other cheap-arsed crappy gimmick that won't really do the job properly anyway!!
Just Sayin'
Last edited by Peter Aawen; 01-14-2023 at 06:43 PM.
And to positively confirm Peter's post, you'll find that an 8 or 10 foot flatbed trailer with a folding ramp will serve you well with many other uses. You'll find out you have many more friends than you thought you had because they'll all be asking to borrow it.
Don't need help loading on a trailer.. Get a trailer with a full width ramp, or build a full width ramp for the trailer you got.
You can just ride the bike on the trailer.
All the stupid videos you see of people falling off ramps or slamming the truck cab, is because they use ramps that do not lock on, and try to load in a pickup truck bed.
The bike trialers are much lower. With a full width ramp, loading is no worse than riding up a slight incline. Loaded plenty of them, and never had a problem.
Coming back off, just put slight pressure on the front brake, slide your feet, and let it roll off the trailer.
Try to load and unload on a little 8 inch wide ramp, you need help. Loading and unloading with a full width ( or at least 4 feet wide) ramp, you can do it alone. Easy as pie!
Looks to me like he is securing his straps to something under the bumper. The bumper mounting bracket possibly? I have towed my BMW with a rig like that a couple of times, but my BMW didn't rely on engine oil to lubricate the transmission. On most bikes the engine oil also lubricates the transmission. Engine not running means no oil being pumped to a transmission that is spinning. As mentioned, remove the drive chain and I would tie the clutch lever back as well. I bought a cheap trailer from Harbor Freight added a wheel chock and it served me well for many years. The guys with the high dollar trailers looked better at the gas pumps, but I got there just as quick as they did.
A different take from others .... I actually had one & used it fairly frequently .... When I was 22 and actually had a car - I also bought a Dirt bike, that I wanted to take to Vermont to go Trail riding in the woods. ... I lived in NYC, had Only street parking available, so had no place for almost anything automotive certainly Not a trailer. So I bought one of these, and put about 6,000 mi on it. .... I did have to remove the drive chain, but that wasn't a big deal IMHO ..... your decision .... Mike
Last edited by BLUEKNIGHT911; 01-15-2023 at 11:20 AM.
OK, I appreciate the wealth of experience you all have. Does anyone know of a trailer that is low to the ground so it will be easy to ride up. I have seen trailers that have a steep ramp.
OK, I appreciate the wealth of experience you all have. Does anyone know of a trailer that is low to the ground so it will be easy to ride up. I have seen trailers that have a steep ramp.
You will find that the trailers with the bed that fits between the wheels have lower bed heights. Those that have a full, flat bed over the top of the wheels are the tall ones.
There are even some of the high end trailers that drop down for loading.
Don't know of any particular one brand. My trailer bed is about 18 inches from the ground, on level ground. Mine is custom built and 20 feet long. You wouldn't need anything like that.
FYI; The deck of my 6X10 foot trailer is 18 inches off the ground. I have a bi-fold full width ramp that extends to 4 feet. So I am climbing 18 inches in 4 feet. Easy-peasy. You can sure get by with a smaller trailer. Lots of options including some that fold up for storage. Good luck
Also note...... Those nylon straps WILL move. You have bike and car suspensions to take into consideration. Any chaffing point can wear and break the strap...... surprisingly fast. The picture in your original post shows the guy having the straps crossing each other. Very scary.
Last edited by canamjhb; 01-15-2023 at 05:29 PM.
2005 Windveil Blue Premium Mustang Convertible
2008 Honda GL1800/California Sidecar Trike, SOLD
2014 Platinum Silver Satin Spyder RTL, SOLD
Semper Fi
OK, I appreciate the wealth of experience you all have. Does anyone know of a trailer that is low to the ground so it will be easy to ride up. I have seen trailers that have a steep ramp.
If you want something small & easy to use, check out Stinger Trailers, one of the Forum's Sponsors listed & linked on the Home Page. They do make trailers for other bikes besides Spyders.
OK, I appreciate the wealth of experience you all have. Does anyone know of a trailer that is low to the ground so it will be easy to ride up. I have seen trailers that have a steep ramp.
Here's what I ended up with. Got it secondhand from a seller on this site. It was a long wait but it was worth it. The bed height is about 12/14' if that. It's covered in snow right now so I'm not going out there to measure that. LOL
OK, I appreciate the wealth of experience you all have. Does anyone know of a trailer that is low to the ground so it will be easy to ride up. I have seen trailers that have a steep ramp.
I had a snowmobile trailer that had NO RAMP at all ..... the trailer Tongue was 12 ft. long and attached to the axle ... the bed had a channel that attached to the Tongue with a large Pin .... when you loaded or unloaded, you pulled the pin and the trailer bed would tilt down to the ground while the Tongue was still attached to your veh..... If a trailer you are looking at doesn't do this. It can with a little modification., as described above. But I would still go with the one in the pic if the bike was 300lb or less ..... JMHO .... Mike
Last edited by Peter Aawen; 07-18-2023 at 03:55 AM.
Reason: sp ;-)
Keep an eye out on marketplace and other sources. There are some "trailer in a bag" (if it's a dirt bike), or kendal trailers that sometime come up. I have picked up a single trailer and 2 dual trailers in the past. Each one I was able to get for $600 or less. I sold the others, but the last one I kept and converted it so that I can actually haul my spyder.
2021 RTL , brake pedal from "Web Boards" chalk white
Tis was one of the comments on the weird contraption
I think this item may have a purpose, but it certainly didn't work for what I needed....
We have a friend of ours that drives a Jeep Wrangler as a "follow" vehicle. Thought this would be good in case we got out and had any trouble. We were also going to use it to help get one of the bikes to a bike rally.
Item was delivered quickly. Assembly instructions were not great, but worked. Not super hard to put together if you have any mechanical knowledge. If not, you may want to get some help.
Put this on the Jeep and put the bike on it. All was great! Thought we had a winner. Until.... we pulled out of the drive way. Jeep - stock 1998 Wrangler with standard tires/wheels (not jacked up). Bike - stock Harley Davidson 883 Super Low.
Issue is... when you make a turn, the wheel, and in turn, the fork is secured to the devise. The angle of the fork from the lift as well as the rake in the fork will then cause the bike to lean DRASTICALLY to the outside of the turn. To the point that pulling out of my driveway the bike leaned over so far that it almost drug the mufflers on the right side of the bike. When making a turn in the opposite direction, the bike leaned over so far that gas ran out of the vent tube from the tank. DEFINATELY leaned more than I would be comfortable with an that was making wide turns out of the driveway into the street. I can't imagine what it would be like if you actually got caught in a tough spot and had to make a tight turn in town.
Understand, the unit itself was built well. And worked well. Bike was easy to load and lift. All of that was fine. It is the basic geometry of the motorcycle during turns that causes the issue. If you only plan to drive on somewhat straight streets from point A to point B… this may be OK. But if you plan on making any turns at all, I would certainly use caution.
Motorcycle Trailer Hitch - what are the straps secured to?
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Originally Posted by Rogue Hawk
Pop an extinction on it and take ya Spyder for a drive. 
Mind you, they do tend to keep the bike recovery &/or repair places in business, if not also putting more $$ in the pockets of the bike sales places when you need to replace your bike after one of those monstrosities has either worn the back end of the bike's driveline out prematurely or worse, mangled the whole thing into a twisted scrap of metal shards bouncing along behind your car & ripping the crap outta it's bumper & rear end/frame too, all before you could bring it all safely to stop! Oh, and my contacts in the Insurance industry love them as perfect reasons for disallowing damage claims to either/both the tow vehicle & the bike too - often just as 'not fit for purpose' tow items, but maybe your insurers over there are more gullible?! 
Had one, got 20ft. and the thing broke. Get a trailer.
