Racor PBH-1R Ceiling-Mounted Bike Lift
by Racor
|
List Price: Our Price: $16.31 You Save: $23.69 (59%) Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days Buy Used: from $10.91 (click here) Category: Tools See more product details |
|---|
Tools and Hardware Reviews of Racor PBH-1R Ceiling-Mounted Bike Lift
Customer Review: Worth the price
Summary: 4 Stars
The bike lift cord appeared fine until it was used a few times - and it became frayed. Both of the lifts I purchased had mildly frayed cords within a few uses. Nothing that causes it to fail, but it was surprising how quickly it occurred.
The lift was easy to install, but the instructions left a lot to be desired. It has the installer meausure the bike's distance between seat and handlebars, but it doesn't say if the measurement, which gets 'transferred to the ceiling' is the distance between pulleys, or does it become the distance between end of one pulley plate to the end of the other? It's hard to measure pulley distance due to the width of the plate, but being 'close enough' appears acceptible because there's a lot of forgiveness in installation width, as the bike is simply 'suspended', accuracy isn't that important, except to be sure your screws are hitting studs.
Also, be sure to rub the screws on a bar of soap before screwing into your 1/8" drilled pilot holes to allow the screws to sink completely into wood stud.
Better quality screws (whose phillips heads are stripped easily), better quality cord and better instructions would warrant five stars, but for the price and quailty I received, it gets a solid 4.
Customer Review: Good product
Summary: 5 Stars
I can't compare this to other similar "bike lifts" since I've never tried any others. But this does seem to be fairly well made and does the job well. I'm so happy to get the bike out of the way in the garage. Some reviewers complained about the quality of the rope but I think it's fine. I also really like the safety mechanism which automatically grabs the rope to stop the bike from falling on it's own. The bike can only be lowered if the rope is held and pulled in a specific way, which is a great safety feature. A couple of notes about installing: (1) The pilot hole size recommended in the instructions is too small. Instructions call for a 1/8" pilot hole into the wood stud. When I drilled the holes this size, I could not screw the screws in. In fact I twisted the head right off one of the screws trying. So I had to go up a couple of drill bit sizes to get a pilot hole that was snug but in which the screw would actually fit. (2) You cannot install this in a sheetrocked garage unless you have a proper stud finder. You absolutely need to screw into studs or this will not be safe.
Installation took me about an hour including carefully planning the location of the lift, finding the studs, drilling new holes after I twisted the head off a screw, etc.
Customer Review: Great idea --> tips for installation needed though:
Summary: 4 Stars
The pulley system works very nicely at raising and lowering my bicycle, but I have a few suggestions
for those installing it:
1) The screws that come with this product are of inferior grade metal. Drill pilot holes!! The heads
strip easily.
2) The anti-fall safety mechanism (Supposed to work like a mini-blind) did not work due to the rope
being too thick. The rope had sufficient friction through its guides to trigger the anti-fall. Thus you
could raise the bike, but it wouldn't come down. It thought the bike was falling 100% of the time.
I had to reroute the rope outside of the anti-fall mechanism (defeating it). No big deal for an adult
user, but a child user might get hurt if the anti-fall mechanism is defeated.
3) Once installed, hook the bike to the hooks and climb a ladder to ceiling. Tension the rope and
mark where the rope meets the mechanism with a piece of masking tape. Climb down, unhook the
bike and pull the rope down. Tie a hefty knot at the masking tape. This way the rope won't get
away from you when you're lowering the bike. It also keeps the kids from pulling on the hooks
and unraveling the whole thing.
Customer Review: I'm satisfied - good mix of quality and functionality
Summary: 4 Stars
I'm a mechanical engineer and look for good design and solid construction when I buy products. Racor's PBH-1R has delivered - it is built well, and works as expected. I now have my favorite hybrid bike winched up to the garage ceiling.
Couple of notes: I especially liked the effective mechanism that prevents a high speed decent and crash. Instructions state budget 30 minutes for installation; mine took about 2 hours by the time I leisurely gathered tools including a stud finder, measured carefully, and went up and down the step ladder a bunch of times. Watching the brief installation video on Racor's website to augment the written instructions was a nice bonus - I wish every manufacturer adopted this practice. For an optimal outcome think through your installation location for this product needs clearance around it to allow for minor swaying and handlebar clearance away from a side wall as the bike goes up and down. A higher ceiling is a plus to get the bike truly out of the way. If your are concerned about creating a "head knocker", measure the height of your bike from ground to highest point and add 6 inches to get an idea how far it will hang down from the ceiling. Be comfortable with that result before buying.
Customer Review: Good with qualifications
Summary: 4 Stars
This product works well but be forewarned, the instructions are only written for upright "wedgie" bikes and not recumbents. If you're one of the more intelligent bike riders who ride a recumbent, then you're going to have to figure out how to mount it without help from the instructions. For instance, measuring from the handlebars to the seat to determine the distance for mounting the brackets on the ceiling won't work with a recumbent. It will depend on whether you have a SWB or LWB recumbent.
I also replaced the rope that came with it with a stronger rope that was double the diameter. The provided rope seemed too flimsy to take the risk of hanging a bike over our autos. However, the rope has to be small enough diameter to be able to be threaded through the locking mechanism. Also, if you're mounting it in a garage without a ceiling you'll have to figure out how to mount it on rafters with a roof angle. Again, if you're a recumbent rider then you'll be smart enough to figure it out, which is probably why they only provide instructions for "wedgie" riders.
After a morning of figuring things out, the Racor Bike Lift works well enough that I bought another one for my wife's recumbent.