So I got back from a family ride and started pulling in the garage when the "crunch" of the bikes on the front of the garage reminded me that our bikes were on top of the car. It ruined the front beam of our roof rack and my wife's bike's front fork; of more concern though is that it yanked up the fixpoints on my (practically new) Mazda 5. Really f*cking stupid, I know. Am I the only person who's ever done this? Any idea what it's going to cost to repair the fixpoints on the car?

I read where others have done the same.. But never hear of what should be done.. Maybe for people with minds like mine (ADHD) putting a picture of bikes on a car taped to the dash.. or fix a mirror on the hood so the bike are seen...

I do stupid stuff way too often and finding solutions to prevent repeat or better, not repeating mistakes of others to be very impotrant to me...

Sorry that happened!

been there done that. I just take the garage door opener out of the car and that has seemed to resolve that issue. As for repairing the fix points, I can't imagine that is going to be easy. Maybe if you post pics that may help. A welding shop should be able to fix anything but it is really going to make a mess of the paint in the process.

I did that at MSP airport, short term parking. Had driven through dozens of times with my road bike w/o problem. This time though I had my touring bike w/ bar ends. The bar ends were about 1/4 inch too tall and CRUNCH! Oh, what a sick sound.

Luckily I was going ultra slow and it hit the hanging low clearance sign above the ticket station instead of the cement ceiling.

The security cam folks could probably put together a good blooper reel of all of us dumb asses that hit that low clearance bar. It was quite scuffed up from multiple collisions.

The frame of the bike was cracked at several points and the top tube folded. The rail of the Thule rack buckled. But the car was completely undamaged. All other parts of the bike were fine too. So I was only out a frame and a rack rail...$500. Ouch.

That was expensive trip to the airport and I didn't even get to go anywhere.

You are not alone. I heard there was similar incident at the A & W in Spring Valley after the Almanzo 100.

Yeah, that was me. I was pretty bonked and not thinking clearly.

What do you mean contact points? Do you have roof rails?

Heh, the roofrack garage crash is almost as common as the "I couldn't get unclipped in time" fall. What can be done? A much taller garage door. Or, not having an opener. Some sort of idiot light might be helpful.

Mazdas (and most new Japanese cars) have threaded bolt receivers hidden under the gutter strips on the roof, sometimes called "fixpoints". They're defined by an industry standard, and so Thule and Yakima both make fixpoint-compatible rack feet to screw down into these. On my car, those fixpoints pulled up and away from the roofline - they didn't actually separate, they just bent upward and back. it looks like the actual receiver "nuts" (for lack of a better descriptor) are welded to narrow strips of metal that then have two long grooves fore and aft of the nut, which are secured to the main roof structure with some sort of smooth-headed bolt (probably welded) so they're designed to give in the event of this type of accident. They did, and not seriously enough to do any damage to the car itself, but it might be a bitch to have them replaced. I shall see.

in the future, could you consider getting one of those racks that attaches to a tow hitch? Or the cheap one secured to the rear of the vehicle with straps?

Trunk racks: Attachment to car not foolproof; bikes can swing around and hit each other; bikes held by top tube, directly on paint; trunk inaccessible.
Hitch racks: pretty secure attachment to car and bike (if they're the tray-type); trunk barely accessible.
Roof racks: ultra secure attachment to car and bike; rack can be left on at all times; racks are often modular to accept kayak mounts, etc; increases clearance, often resulting in 'doh' moments.

Do you have a sun roof?.. I always leave the shutter (the extra slidy thing that blocks out the sun and makes it more quiet) open so that you can see them up there, and also obviously hear them a bit more. But when I have my bike on top I am frequently checking it for some reason. Once in awhile I happen to notice that I left my light or computer on.


My dad and I did this one time (he was driving) but it was going under a clearance post that had a big hanging PVC tube stating what the clearance was. If I recall my bike stayed on top, his bike got yanked all the way off and hit the ground and it pulled down the whole PVC tube.


If this was the first time it happened to you, it probably wont again. Hopefully it wont be too expensive to fix your car, I am sure you already spent enough on it! heh.


Also, does anyone have some type of cloth deflector thing that goes over your fork and handlebars while its on the rack to protect it from bugs? I am wondering if this would also help with wind deflection/guidance/reduce (you mean what I know) drag to help with gas milage.

Thanks for all the advice, kind words, etc. Unfortunately our GDO is a homelink built into the mirror so throwing it in the back seat isn't really an option. Never thought I'd call homelink a disadvantage, but here we are. Don't have a moonroof so that's out. I'm thinking big orange sign on the garage door itself, big orange sign hanging from the pull cable inside the garage, AND a piece of orange cardboard over the homelink button.

Good news is it sounds like the fixpoints on the car will be $350 to repair, I fixed my wife's front fork for $60 (thanks Freewheel) and I can replace the crossbar on the Thule rack for $70 (that's actually a set, guess I'll swap out the rear one too) so $500 for a stupid fuckup isn't too bad. I still need to give my bike a close inspection but I think it somehow survived without injury - thrown from the roof and all.

You're looking for a bike bra (or bike bro, depending on the gender of your bicycle.)

I've had decent success avoiding this predicament by placing something in the garage to block my access. Get out of the car and have a Homeresque DOH! moment. The other thing is I put a postie on the windshield with the overhead clearance (+3" to be safe) in feet and inches.

And be grateful some un-insured douche didn't squish the bike on your trunk rack at wally mart.

As to the bike bra: they work, but don't seem to last very long. Even then, extensive bug guts will eventually seep through the spandexy fabric. It also increase drag appreciably.