Bike carrier or trailer for kids--what's your opinion?

[Joyous_5]

Hi All,

My husband and I love to bike and have been using a bike trailer for our son who is 2. Unfortunately, it's very uncomfortable for him. The seat is like a sling and he's constantly squished and miserable looking.

We're looking at replacing it with:

a) A front-mounted bike carrier (I like the reviews of ibert)
b) A rear-mounted bike carrier
c) A new bicyle trailer that has a good, sturdy seat inside and folds

Do you have experience with any of the above? If so, what is your favorite for transporting a child?

I should note that we need to transport our bicycles most often, to ride on a safe bike path. Our road in the country is rather busy and has very narrow shoulders.

Thanks in advance.

[Rosemary]

We used a bike trailer until DD was 3, at which point she was too tall for it. Then we got one of those tagalong bike attachments and used that until she was 7. She loved that!

[Bronxboy]

I bought a rear-mounted bike carrier for my daughter when she was a toddler but never got comfortable with her riding in it. I sold it long before she outgrew it.

[Joyous_5]

Hmmmm, thanks for the feedback. I'm going to the local bike shop at the end of the week to see what they have. I hope that they have one I can try out (even without my son in it) just to get a feel for how cumbersome a mounted bike seat is. Thanks for the info!

[Rosemary]

I should add that we purchased both the bike trailer and the tagalong used, and sold them for the same amount that we paid for them. The tagalong was useful even after DD could ride a 2-wheeler, for longer family trips and trips that involved busy intersections.

[Spartana]

My 60 lb dog rides in a 2 child size bike carrier with a sling seat. What I do is put a couple of standard size bed pillows in the space under the sling seat to give him more cushioning and stability. So most of his weight is on the cushions rather than the seat - which just acts like a covering. You might try that instead of buying another trailer. You'll probably have to put something in the leg well of the trailer against the pillows to keep them in place. I put 2 more bed pillows in the leg area so my dog can stretch out across the whole length and width of the trailer. You can't do that with you kid of course but maybe a peice of foam or something.

Oops! I just reread the OPs post and realized you were saying that your kid was uncomfortable in the trailer because it was too small not because of the sling seat wasn't comfortable.

[cynergyou]

I have 3 kids, with the youngest being 6 years old. When my youngest was only 2 years old, I rode everywhere with him. We logged over 1000 miles together one season. I used a bike mounted child carrier. It was a Rhode Gear model that mounted on a Blackburn aluminum rear rack. That was great. We rode everywhere until he was about 4, then we switched to the 2 child bike trailer. I think the rear bike seat/carrier was ideal for the young one because he could sit up tall and look around and see everything. As he got older, he got physically too big for the seat so we had to go to the trailer. He still enjoyed being in the trailer. It wasn't a fancy one and the seats were just made of nylon, but at 3/4 he was much taller and stronger and better suited for it. We actually owned the trailer for a long time (I think we bought it before the seat) but used the seat in the early years because it was more comfortable and better suited for the little kids.

when he turned 5 we switched to a tag along bike which he can still use now. It attaches to my bicycle and converts the bike into a tandem.

A word of caution - if you use a bicycle seat, be careful! When the child is loaded in the bike seat, the weight distribution and the handling of your bike might change fairly dramatically. If you're not careful, you could lose your balance and fall. Also, when I rode up very steep hills with the bike seat, the weight on the back of the bike made my bike want to do a wheelie, so I had to lean forward over the handlebars to prevent the bike from doing a wheelie.