Thule Epos 2-bike platform towbar bike rack review

The Thule Epos 2-bike platform towbar bike rack is the Swedish company’s premium model.

It’s stacked with cleverly thought-out features – such as folding sides and lockable ratchet straps to secure your bike to the rack, which should help to justify the cost.

It introduces a whole different way of affixing your pride and joy, using telescopic arms, from previous Thule models.

Although expensive, if you frequently drive to your local riding spot, the Epos is an impressive bike rack for your car, reducing bike-loading time.

It has proven to be robust during the test period, too, and it’s stable at motorway speeds, even when loaded with electric bikes.

Thule Epos 2-bike platform towbar bike rack details and specifications

Available in two- (tested here) and three-bike versions, it can accommodate the longest downhill and enduro wheelbases (up to 1,350mm), large-diameter frame tubes and tyres (3in or 4.7in with adaptor), and heavy ebikes (up to 30kg).

An aluminium structure makes for a sturdy but not overly heavy platform (it weighs 17.3kg unloaded), while the contact points are moulded plastic.

Each bike is secured to the rack using height-adjustable telescopic arms that extend vertically from its base. These have lockable ratchet clamps that fix to your bike’s tubes and can be locked.

The rack attaches via a handbrake-esque handle that can be locked in position.

Once the bikes are on, the entire unit can be tilted for access to your boot, thanks to a pedal just below the number-plate holder (which has all the usual electric hook-up capability).

Thule Epos 2-bike platform towbar bike rack performance

The Thule Epos 2-bike platform towbar bike rack is an incredibly well-thought-out piece of kit.

It folds up into a small package to hide away in your garage or porch when you’re not using it; the two sides of the rack fold down to form the base and then, with the tyres, sit in plastic trays.

The handbrake-esque handle can be locked in position so even when the bikes aren’t on it, it's not easy to steal.

However, the best feature is the two telescopic arms (one for each bike).

These attach to bikes by whichever main bike tube is the most convenient, because they are fully rotatable and can move through 360 degrees to place pretty much wherever you fancy on the bike.

The arms are fully independent of each other, so there is no banging and rubbing between bikes and arms.

Rather than using the traditional frame-trashing clamp, they use a lockable plastic-coated metal ratchet strap with a nice rubbery protective section.

Gone are the days of arduous wrangling to fit two bikes on a rack to get the old-style attachment arms and clamps, which had a limited range of movement, to line up and not rub your rear shock/precious paintjob, and avoid bar and seat clashes.

Once the bikes are on the rack, the entire unit can be tilted for access to your boot thanks to a pedal just below the number-plate holder.

In practice, the Thule Epos carrier is the best bike rack I have encountered, and so it should be for the price.

What you get for the money is a solid, easily attached, transportable platform with myriad well-designed, useful features that make transporting bikes of any kind a joy.

Having jostled bikes on and off many different racks over the years, including some of Thule’s EasyFold models, this system is head and shoulders above the rest.

At motorway speeds, the rack remains stable, not shaking or wobbling even when fully loaded with two chunky ebikes.

Thule Epos 2-bike platform towbar bike rack bottom line

It is an expensive option, but if you are using it on a regular basis that extra cost is money well spent with the reduction in inconvenience this rack brings.

The bike-attachment options are second to none and a step up from the simple clamp on the end of an arm that most bike racks utilise.

It has proven to be robust during the test period; I've been using it in all weather for a multitude of different bikes, three or four times a week over the past three months, without a hitch.