[ERivTruck]

Comical that the patent shows Rivian as a Plymouth, MI based company! 😂

 

[O. horridus]

No, it shows "Rivian IP Holdings, LLC" as based in Plymouth, MI. That's a different company than Rivian Automotive, Inc. I'm sure there are very good reasons they chose to incorporate that LLC in Michigan (and good reasons to make it an LLC as well, rather than a C corporation). Well-established case law for the automotive industry, for example.

 

[eHauler]

Smart design but it would be great if the final version has the ability to secure two bikes.

 

[RITVT]

There are two grooves for the attachment points, so looks like that is already the case.

 

[GolfProFred]

Nice!

We have a tandem bike. Still trying to figure out what my options are.

 

[Yoshi]

Have they done anything to keep the tailgate from bouncing up and down when you hit a good bump?
Also, too narrow for most MT bikes, fat bikes and larger road bikes. They would be much better off locking the tailgate down, orienting bikes fore and aft with a (front) wheel off fork mount. Clearly there are no cyclists on that design team.

 

[RITVT]

I would have liked to have seen fore-aft grooves in the bed running lengthwise out through the tailgate (instead of this cross-wise design too).
If you look at the grooves, they are only there to support the wheel blocks for securing the bikes, so there is no reason the wheel blocks couldn't be designed to support anything from a road bike to fatbike tire, but it would be tough to get two MTB's of the same size to fit next to each other without having them touching somewhere.
This is another reason why the 1-Up & Quikr racks are so good.
If my tailgate had this feature, I wouldn't use it.
I would just keep using my hitch-mounted 1-Up (and have the potential to load up to 4 bikes... And load them much more easily).

 

[R99]

Have they done anything to keep the tailgate from bouncing up and down when you hit a good bump?
Also, too narrow for most MT bikes, fat bikes and larger road bikes. They would be much better off locking the tailgate down, orienting bikes fore and aft with a (front) wheel off fork mount. Clearly there are no cyclists on that design team.

That's a good question, too bad there isn't more detail from this pantent about that. I'd be surprised if there wasn't a way for you to lock the tailgate down if Rivian does make this rack.

 

[eHauler]

Have they done anything to keep the tailgate from bouncing up and down when you hit a good bump?
Also, too narrow for most MT bikes, fat bikes and larger road bikes. They would be much better off locking the tailgate down, orienting bikes fore and aft with a (front) wheel off fork mount. Clearly there are no cyclists on that design team.

Don't see anything in the patent drawings or the text that goes with it, but having the ability to lock it into position should do it. What helps too is that should be a very simple thing to implement.

 

[PAFDenver]

The current tailgate doesn't have those grooves. So if they were to ever make this, it will have to be for a future tailgate design.