Re:Roof racks

My new (second hand) car (2010 model) has a rhino rack on it. It looks to be a good quality unit. Anyway, at the weekend I had the opportunity to use it. I put a large wooden bookcase on top. It seemed to carry it okay, but I wasn't game to travel more than 80kph. Anyway, I was generally impressed, but the experience made me wonder about what holds the rack to the car. Does anyone know?

The last roof rack I came across was around the mid '80s and it had four brackets (nut and bolt fixing) that hooked under the roof gutter. The gutter in older cars is pretty solid: that's where the roof and sides panels of the car come together and are spot welded and bent upward to catch water from the roof. So, not only does the bend lend itself to adding strength the material is twice as thick as most other parts of the car. It naturally lends itself to supporting loads.

So, are modern roof racks (which are designed for cars with no gutter) held on by a few self-tapping screws? That'd be a damn scary thought.

Some roof racks attach to the roof rails and some attach to the roof studs after the rails are removed. The studs are significantly stronger but I wouldn't have recommended carrying a large wooden book case with either type of rack. Be prepared to get an earfull concerning that. The maximum roof load, including rack, is listed as 30kg by Suzuki. With a roof rack, the most sensible approach is to copy a backpacking mentality. Camping would be a good example. The safest utilization would be for lightweight bulky items such as pillows, sleeping bags and clothes leaving room on the inside for heavier items.

If you want a rack, the best thing would be to mount it to the studs and keep the weight 30ish kg.

Lambert wrote: I have replaced my plastic longitudinal bars for steel transverse ones using the existing roof studs. I use them regularly on the farm to move long items that won't go inside like feed troughs. You can definitely feel the weight up high. I went for 2 simple bars rather than some kind of platform or basket because for my use anything on the roof is self supporting and a basket or platform is dead weight. It's worth noting that my bars might weigh 2.5kg between them but some of the platforms especially the modular design type can be getting close to 30kg on their own. It's very easy to overload a jimny without trying and once they are they really let you know about it.

Nice work Lambert,another great idea I'm going pinch from you, i guess farmers the world over are innervators

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I am already looking at local ads where people give away their thule roof bars for free.
Did you make the brackets between the studs and bars yourself Lambert?

I now got the original rails and some prorack bars that fit in between the rails.
looks ok and they can take the planks I need for my projects. (not a farmer but still..)