Roof racks...diy possibly

[twitchie88]

Hey everyone
Has anyone made a diy roof rack?
What materials did you use?
How did you join it?
Etc etc etc

I need one pretty bad ive found a set of rails second hand for 90 bux
But been thinking i may make one myself
I need to carry a 2.4 level, so will be in pvc piping with a locking end cap.
Also want to put a few ladders on top but want to be able to lock them up.
So maybe thinking somthing like a full length rack rather than just rails.

What do you guys think?

[erad]

Not directly answering your question about a full length rack, I made a set of roof bars fr my NL Pajero many years ago. I used some 32 mm hollow square tubing for the bars, and made the gutter stands from some 2.5 mm thick galv plate I had laying around. I fixed the bars to the gutter stands by welding some lugs on the sides of the bars and bolted the bars to the gutter stands. It was very strong. I then loaded the bars with 3 ladders and about 5 wooden planks on the bars and headed off to Melbourne to help my Sister paint her new house.

The gutter stands had some plastic covering for the feet so they didn't scratch the paint in the gutters, but they had no lateral bracing. End result - the whole assembly (in retrospect, far too heavy) developed sideways shakes and dented the sides of the roof on my brand new NL. Not happy. I finished up by eventually welding some 50 mm gussets onto the gutter stands at the roof bar level, and this tamed the shaking sufficiently, although there was still a tendency to vibrate sideways on rough roads.

I subsequently bought some aero shaped bars which looked good and made less noise (the old home made bars used to make a lot of wind noise). Problem was that they had no provision for laterally locating any loads I out up there, so I drilled the bars and put a 5 mm bolt protruding slightly above the surface. That way, I could use the bolt as a stopper and lash the loads (timber, steel tubes etc) against the bolt.

I still have both sets of bars and if anyone wants them. pls pm me and I'll see how to get them to you.

[El_Freddo]

I just picked up a tradies rack from a Mercedes tradie van of some sort from Pick a Part for $50. This is 2.4m x 3.8m and weighs a tonne. It will be getting a diet and a cut down.

The same sort of rack can be found at Jolly’s u pullit but they charge $129 for a tradies rack.

I’m playing with this as I can’t buy material for this price, and there’s already some neatly bent corners to use and the roof mounts too. Quite a score for what I want to do I reckon.

Cheers

Bennie

[bobthekelpy]

Hey everyone
Has anyone made a diy roof rack?
What materials did you use?
How did you join it?
Etc etc etc

I need one pretty bad ive found a set of rails second hand for 90 bux
But been thinking i may make one myself
I need to carry a 2.4 level, so will be in pvc piping with a locking end cap.
Also want to put a few ladders on top but want to be able to lock them up.
So maybe thinking somthing like a full length rack rather than just rails.

What do you guys think?

I just fitted a Rhino rack Pioneer system to my NT. I have the old roof racks you can have for nothing if you can pick them up. I'm close to you, but PM me for info.

[twitchie88]

I just picked up a tradies rack from a Mercedes tradie van of some sort from Pick a Part for $50. This is 2.4m x 3.8m and weighs a tonne. It will be getting a diet and a cut down.

The same sort of rack can be found at Jolly’s u pullit but they charge $129 for a tradies rack.

I’m playing with this as I can’t buy material for this price, and there’s already some neatly bent corners to use and the roof mounts too. Quite a score for what I want to do I reckon.

Cheers

Bennie

Wow thats really good!
Where is pick a part?