Product Test – Oxford Products front paddock stand
The publicity blurb for the Oxford Products front paddock stand tells you about the four chunky wheels, the 40mm tube and the specially designed rests for the forks.
What it doesn’t tell you is that the bike falls off it.
It does advise you in the instructions not to leave the bike unattended, but the mind boggles at how you are supposed to do that and get a front tyre changed without turning your back on the machine.
Anyway, I was lucky. Having acquired the Oxford stand to change the front tyre rather than use my usual improvised method of jacks and bits of wood under the engine block, I took the precaution of putting the spindle back through the forks once the wheel was out and supporting the weight of the bike via a scissor jack.
Even so, when the jack was removed, the stand flexed had inward enough that I had a real problem getting the newly fitted wheel back in through the rests, which are a bit too close together for a typical front wheel even when set at maximum width.
I eventually managed to get the discs past the supporting ‘prongs’, and had JUST put the spindle back through the wheel and spacers when the fork rest on one side unscrewed itself and allowed the bike to fall off the stand.
Fortunately for me, the bike landed on the front wheel and the rear end stayed put on my old rear stand, so no harm was done.
My partner mentioned the near-accident to a biker in her office who wasn’t surprised. He’d had exactly the same thing happen and his bike had landed on the fork bottoms which were damaged by the impact.
The problem is that the fork rests screw into the tubed part of the stand with a locknut to secure it. Whilst the weight of the bike turns one rest tighter, the other is at risk of being pushed round in the opposite direction, and it’s next to impossible to tighten up the locknut sufficiently to make it 100% secure.
I guess you could try using thread locking compound on the bolt-up rests, or perhaps even spot-weld it in place, and the rests themselves could be hacksawed off to offer the correct clearance for the front wheel, but should you have to?
One to avoid.