removing tabs on fork

[whittierider]

For Mag in NH: simply turn your rooftop bike mount around so that the front of the bike faces backward. That way there won't be so much air pressure pulling up on the handlebars/fork.

Like someone else said, the big problem is not pressure from the front, but the side-to-side motion that tends to pry the fork ends away, one side at a time.  You could go ahead and file them down but not quite all the way, so that opening the skewer still lets the wheel out but there's still a barrier to a closed skewer.

[valygrl]

+1, but in many years of hauling bikes quite a few of which were made before lawyer lips were used, and some with them filed off, I have never had a problem with a fork coming loose from the rack.

Last year TWO of my friends' bikes with filed-off lawyer tabs unclipped from roof racks.  One was on a car I was riding in, and I know it was racked carefully (though I didn't do it myself).  Luckily someone in another car warned us before the bike fell over all the way, but it was leaning on my bike when we pulled over.  The other bike wasn't so lucky, it tipped over the side of the car, held on by it's rear wheel strap, the tip of the fork broke off, and there was some other damage to the bike. 

Both bikes had carbon forks, FWIW.  Personally after seeing/hearing about this, I wouldn't file them unless it was on a race bike where a quick wheel change was actually important.

[jrswenberger]

I still ride the same 3 bikes I bought in the mid-80's. They all came with cromoly forks and no lawyer lips. Together, they've probably logged 10-20k miles on the roof rack. I've used Thule, Yakima and Rocky Mounts fork mounts. I've never had a fork blade even work itself loose.

I wonder if the people having trouble with roof mounted fork mounts are the same ones having trouble mounting their wheels in the dropouts properly...leading to the over-abundance of lawyer lips.

Jay

[John Nelson]

Could there be some difference between dropouts that never had tabs and dropouts with the tabs filed off?

[staehpj1]

Could there be some difference between dropouts that never had tabs and dropouts with the tabs filed off?

Yes, especially if they were filed off in a way that left the faces of the dropout anything but parallel.  My advice would be, in the interest of prudence, if you file them off just file enough of the tab that the wheel can be quickly removed and carefully avoid filing anything except the tab itself.

BTW, I've driven at least tens of thousands of miles and probably hundreds of thousands with bikes with no lawyer lips on top of the cars and never had one come loose.  That includes the time I foolishly misjudged the clearance and slammed one into an overhang hard enough to bend the bars and slide the rack back a few inches.