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Feedback Sports Velo Hinge

10
£27.99

VERDICT:

10
10
Probably the last bike wall hook you'll ever have to buy
Weight: 
916g

At road.cc every product is thoroughly tested for as long as it takes to get a proper insight into how well it works. Our reviewers are experienced cyclists that we trust to be objective. While we strive to ensure that opinions expressed are backed up by facts, reviews are by their nature an informed opinion, not a definitive verdict. We don't intentionally try to break anything (except locks) but we do try to look for weak points in any design. The overall score is not just an average of the other scores: it reflects both a product's function and value – with value determined by how a product compares with items of similar spec, quality, and price.

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The Feedback Sports Velo Hinge is literally a new twist on an old bike storage idea – and it's executed beautifully.

Firstly, let's get one thing out of the way: yes, you can purchase a hook to hang a bike from for a few quid. It will have a plastic coating so as not to gouge your rims, and will offer years of elevated cycle retention service. If all you want to do is hang a bike from a wall, do not read any further, and certainly don't feel obliged to post comments along the lines of 'Nearly THIRTY QUID for a HOOK?'. To do so is to miss the point of the Velo Hinge, and somewhere a road.cc comments fairy will die.

If you are looking for a more nuanced wall-centric space-efficient cycle storage solution that's re-configurable, future-proof and highly likely to be passed on in your will, read on...

> Find your nearest dealer here

> Buy this online here

Take your marks

The secret sauce of the Velo Hinge is its ability to hinge your velo (never let it be said the FBS Marketing Dept don't earn their crust). The plastic-covered hook folds out from the wall plate, your front tyre rests on the plate, and the whole thing swings from perpendicular to as far over left or right as your handlebar will allow. The resultant bike or pile of bikes then only protrudes as far as the widest handlebar you have in your fleet.

Feedback Sports Velo Hinge - full bike.jpg

You can choose a left or right-hand swing prior to installation by undoing the hinge bolt and flipping the hook bit over, and there's a small bit of curved metal called the 'wheel bumper' that your back tyre sits against, so when you swing the bike it doesn't slide along the wall.

Feedback Sports Velo Hinge - bottom wheel supports.jpg

As you can appreciate, the distance between the hinge and bumper is specific to the wheelbase of the bike concerned; 20mm or so difference won't matter, but obviously a 650C or child's bike is never going to fit the same footprint as a large road or mountain bike. If you really need to share the same hook between multiple-wheelbase bikes then a bit of wood, handle or just about anything protruding from the wall will do to keep the rear wheel vertical from the hook.

Also, you need to appreciate where the bike is going to swing to and from, so having a friend along to help measure and mark is a good idea. Think it through, then drill.

Five hefty wood screws are provided, but you'll need your own masonry kit if going into brick/concrete. The Velo Hinge is rated to 22.7kg, so e-bikes and Dutch monsters aside, it'll hold anything with two wheels. The top of the plate does flex a bit under load, but that's fine – you get the feeling the Velo Hinge could hang a moped if needed.

Get set

The hook of the Velo Hinge is good to hold tyres up to 2.4in/61mm wide and tyre-rim combos up to 74mm deep – so that's probably 95 per cent of mountain and road bikes out there. For seriously deep-section rims there's the Long Velo Hinge Hook, which takes rim/tyre combos up to 99mm deep and is an aftermarket purchase for £10 that you then swap out the original hook for.

Feedback Sports Velo Hinge - hook on rim.jpg

Offerring your bike up to the Velo Hinge is no harder than to any other hook – lift, brace the saddle against your thigh, turn the bars a bit and then back to get the hook around the rim, then drop back down.

As the wheelbase is bike-specific it makes sense to hang children's and shorter people's bikes lower – which will also help with handlebar clearance when folded over the the side. This is the party trick of the Velo Hinge – if you have a garage with maybe a metre or so between wall and car, or a narrow hallway, the Velo Hinge will let you fill an entire wall with bikes you can then walk past while folded so long as they are in the right order.

Feedback Sports Velo Hinge - against wall.jpg

When you want to get a bike out, fold open the ones 'on top' of it, remove, then fold the others back. A very good solution for cramped offices, car park basements in workplaces, flats, that sort of thing. Some bike shops use Velo Hinges to store bikes for repair, hire or even sale, where space is at a premium.

> Want to start fettling your own bikes? Here's a guide to the essential tools for beginners

There's a similar solution called the Steadyrack for £65 that does the same job, but it doesn't fold away as discreetly (when not in use, the Velo Hinge hook folds down behind the hinged section, which then goes flat against the wall), and is pretty limited on wheel sizes it will work with, from 20in to 29 (the Velo Hinge will work right down to tiny kids' bikes).

Feedback Sports Velo Hinge - folded.jpg

The Velo Hinge comes with a three-year warranty, and the design is patent-pending.

Go

If you need to store multiple bikes, whatever the size, type or number, up to 22.7kg in weight, the Velo Hinge has you sorted. As your fleet grows/changes, simply remount the hook and bumpers to suit. If all you have is a fiver and loads of room it's clearly not for you. Horses/bike-wall-hook courses.

Verdict

Probably the last bike wall hook you'll ever have to buy

road.cc test report

Make and model: Feedback Sports Velo Hinge

Size tested: n/a

Tell us what the product is for, and who it's aimed at. What do the manufacturers say about it? How does that compare to your own feelings about it?

It's for people wanting to store one or several bikes, vertically on a wall, and be efficient about the footprint.

Feedback Sports says: "The Velo Hinge from Feedback Sports is an affordable, patent pending bike wall rack with simple, innovative technology for conveniently storing your bicycle. Store your bike closer to the wall. A sleek way to save space without the swaying."

Tell us some more about the technical aspects of the product?

Hinge design allows bike to swing left or right

Optimizes available storage area

Fold hook away when not in use

Wheel bumper stabilizes bike and prevents swaying

Fits most standard Road, Mountain and Kids bikes

Powder coated steel

7.25' X 3.5' X 0.63' (185mm X 90mm X 16mm)

Load Capacity: 50lbs

Assembled to pivot left (changeable)

Ships best in 10pk

3 year warranty

Patent Pending

Weight 2 lbs

Dimensions 11.25 x 5.5 x 0.75 in

Rate the product for quality of construction:
 
10/10

The metal is hefty and well-machined.

Rate the product for performance:
 
10/10

Does exactly what it says, flawlessly.

Rate the product for durability:
 
8/10

I'm sure it will last for years, but it's probably a bit too early for any perfect scores on this one

Rate the product for value:
 
8/10

If you need this product to save space, it's genius; if you don't need to save space, it's irrelevant (but still works very well).

Tell us how the product performed overall when used for its designed purpose

Cannot fault it. At all.

Tell us what you particularly liked about the product

The design. There's been some serious thinking done here.

Tell us what you particularly disliked about the product

Nothing.

Did you enjoy using the product? Yes

Would you consider buying the product? Yes

Would you recommend the product to a friend? Yes

Use this box to explain your score

After a few months of use and consideration, I cannot think how to improve this product.

Overall rating: 10/10

About the tester

Age: 42  Height: 183cm  Weight: 72kg

I usually ride: Charge Juicer  My best bike is:

I've been riding for: Over 20 years  I ride: A few times a week  I would class myself as: Expert

I regularly do the following types of riding: club rides, general fitness riding, fixed/singlespeed, mountain biking, and Dutch bike pootling

Living in the Highlands, Mike is constantly finding innovative and usually cold/wet ways to accelerate the degradation of cycling kit. At his happiest in a warm workshop holding an anodised tool of high repute, Mike's been taking bikes apart and (mostly) putting them back together for forty years. With a day job in global IT (he's not completely sure what that means either) and having run a boutique cycle service business on the side for a decade, bikes are his escape into the practical and life-changing for his customers.

Add new comment

8 comments

Avatar
StraelGuy | 7 years ago
1 like

My bikes are one on the living room wall on hangers made from 2x4s and locked with a gold secure chain, the posh bike leans against the wall and is gold secure chained to 56 lb weight. A benefit of being single I guess.

Avatar
kitsunegari replied to StraelGuy | 7 years ago
3 likes
guyrwood wrote:

My bikes are one on the living room wall on hangers made from 2x4s and locked with a gold secure chain, the posh bike leans against the wall and is gold secure chained to 56 lb weight. A benefit of being single I guess.

Indeed. For all I've spent on anchors and chains in the garage, I can't help but feel that things would have just worked out easier if I'd bought a single one and just chained the wife up instead!

Avatar
kitsunegari | 7 years ago
0 likes

I bought something similar off ebay for £6.99.

At £27.99, the cost seems very much at odds with the function.

Avatar
Snake8355 | 8 years ago
0 likes

Am I the only person who's allowed to leave their bike at the bottom of the stairs?

However a very good idea. 

Avatar
Alex222 | 8 years ago
1 like

Had already eyed these up for my bike storage room, once the extension all happens.

Avatar
PaulBox | 8 years ago
2 likes

Nearly £30 for a bike hook.... 

 

Sorry, but I might have to buy a few of these, could get my garage sorted out.

Avatar
KiwiMike replied to PaulBox | 8 years ago
2 likes
PaulBox wrote:

Nearly £30 for a bike hook.... 

 

I was seriously beginning to think no-one would bite  

Avatar
lukea-d | 8 years ago
2 likes

After seeing a neighbour's shed lined with these (and very impressive it was), I created the same function on the cheap as follows:

  1. buy a vertical hook for a fiver (e.g. http://www.chainreactioncycles.com/x-tools-wallmount-bike-storage-hanger/rp-prod10230);
  2.  fix it near one end of a 6ft length of  2x1 timber;
  3. screw a short piece of guttering along the other end (for the rear wheel); then
  4. attach the timber to the wall with a couple of hinges.

It doesn't look as stylish, mind!

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