Roof rack/tray advice please

[spooky Junior Member Find all posts View Profile Close spooky]

Hi all

I am planning a trip to the top end and the Kimberleys for next year. I will be doing Kakadu, the Bungles, Gibb River Rd etc. I think I will need a bit of extra room for a second spare wheel and tyre and the maxtrax so was thinking about a roof tray/rack. I currently have the rails and a set of two toyota aerobars, I believe they are the same as the rhino aero bars.

I will only put the rack on for the trip, otherwise I am happy with just the roof rails on the vehicle.

From what I gather if I buy a Rhino Pioneer alloy tray I would need to remove the rails and buy and put up the heavy duty legs to support the tray. Bit over $1000.

Rhino also do what they call alloy trays. These can be mounted on aero bars. To do this I would need to buy a tray and the fitting kit and so I would be more looking at $700 but more importantly than the price difference I would be able to keep my roof rails.

My question is would I be okay with this setup, an alloy tray mounted to aero bars which are in turn mounted to the roof rails. Or is this not a smart idea on a long trip over some rough tracks.

thanks for any input.

Brett

[rhs58 Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close rhs58]

Did the same trip a couple of years ago, and crossed the Simpson the year before, and Vic High Country last year.
Used a medium Rhino Platform Basket (about $250 incl u-bolts if memory serves me correctly) mounted on 2 Thule Aerobars (about $140 new off EBay) mounted on the Toyota rails.
All stayed solid and carried a spare wheel, OzTent, gas bottle, and a storage box up there. Also spare water and some firewood from time to time.
I didnt want to spend the $700-1000 for Rhino's alloy tray or even more for ARB rack.
The flat Platform Basket also just allowed me to fit the Prado under the open garage door, whereas the Alloy tray or ARB rack would have had to come off to get in the garage.

[Guest Close Guest]

If you are just going to carry a spare tyre and a set of Maxtrax and nothing else, I would strap the tyre to the existing crossbars that you have and fashion up some brackets for the Maxtrax like this
http://www.pradopoint.com/showthread...l=1#post292608

EDIT: There's also this product from Rhino
http://www.rhinorack.com.au/AccSubCa...er_155_49.aspx

[coopernookian Lurker Find all posts View Profile Close coopernookian]

Just drove from sydney to port hedland via Nullabour,Esperance margret river and up the coast road. We fitted a Rooftop tent to our 120 installing directly to the toyota Rino rails and bars. Halfway over the front supports started to give way. We made it home by spacing the rails with az great aussie inventiion (Thongs worked a treat)

So it looks like i will also have to replace the rails with something more sturdy any suggestions greatly appreciated.

We stayed on the black top never really went off road (it ws a quick trip to bring back the prado)
I have spoken to lots from the NW WA that have done the gibb river they say it will find any weak links in your car
If i was going to do the gibb river i would certainly find the sttrongest bar i could especially with a RFT onboard

[Guest Close Guest]

What exactly was giving way? It sounds like you had crossbar mounted onto the north-south rails. It would be better to replace the north-south rails and replace it with the 3-bar heavy duty cross bars. Then try and load spread the RTT across the 3 bars.

[craigm Addicted PP Member Find all posts View Profile Close craigm]

If you are just going to carry a spare tyre and a set of Maxtrax and nothing else, I would strap the tyre to the existing crossbars that you have and fashion up some brackets for the Maxtrax like this
http://www.pradopoint.com/showthread...l=1#post292608

EDIT: There's also this product from Rhino
http://www.rhinorack.com.au/AccSubCa...er_155_49.aspx

Heres the maxtrax mounted up on my sportz racks. You could always get a cheap cage and put your spare and anything else (fuel etc) up top along with it...

[granite Lurker Find all posts View Profile Close granite]

I contemplated doing something very similar for a recent trip to Cape York. (Fitting my old (cut down in length) Opposite Lock alloy rack to the factory rails by means of Rhino heavy duty feet and cross rails.) Being conservative (perhaps too much so) I removed the plastic covers from the factory rails where they attach to the roof to have a look. The material looks like a cast aluminum and not as thick as I'd hoped - that is gut feel only as I don't know what 'thick enough' should be... Also there is a reasonable length between the actual roof mounting point and the closest that you can get the Rhino foot meaning that there is a bit of leverage there.

In the end I bought a steel roof rail replacement from Tradesman to replace the factory rails. A bit of a nuisance to fit but it took about 45 minutes including application of some silicon around the bolts. (Swapped it back off on the weekend in about the same time.)

This was a bit of a pain, but I won't do it often and I felt that the cost of getting it wrong was pretty high. If it breaks how do you re-pack your gear and what can you do with the actual rack? Expensive to leave on the road side! Corrugations can be pretty harsh and can go on for days up there.

As I said I don't really know what's strong enough - just relating what I did.

[chester ver 2.0 Member Find all posts View Profile Close chester ver 2.0]

I have the above setup to craigm with the rhino 3 bar heavy duty racks, however i find a rarly use the third bar and it works a treat i like the heavy duty bar setup as it is modular for a trip i usually have the following
Spare wheel carrier, bicke rack eaither side and shovel holder
Round town i take the bike rack off and throw the kayacks up there
Bueaty of it is that it is all modular so i can change configuration in 10 mins

A tip however is if you put the spare up there mount it as far foward as possible so you get some aero dynamics i first had it back and it really upset stability. put a ruler on the windscreen pointing up then move the tyre foward so the leading edge touches the ruler i played with this over 20,000k around oz and this seemed to be the best balance of aerodynamics and stability

[Guest Close Guest]

As far as aerodynamics is concerned, 4WDs should be designed backwards! Pointy end should be at the back.
I always mount my luggages right at the front of the roof platform, with the big one at the front, and smaller bags tapering off towards the back.

[Shan Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close Shan]

How about this....

Nowhere near solid as the Rhino setup but for the things you plan to put-in
it's more than enough and cost only $225. Best of all you can take it off in minutes without any help or tools.

[craigm Addicted PP Member Find all posts View Profile Close craigm]

I have the above setup to craigm with the rhino 3 bar heavy duty racks,

??....I'm actually running with 2 x 1260mm sportz bars on OME roof rails and a cheapo mesh cage. works fine for me!

[nickchap Member Find all posts View Profile Close nickchap]

Hi Brett

I have the pioneer alloy tray on 6 H/D legs. It carries my roof top tent and second spare.



The reason I used the Alloy rack was that it is a lot lighter than other option for what weight I was putting on top of the car.
I'm just under 100KG. You must first consider the weight and distibution of the weight when looking a racks.
I have done the Simpson and Googs Track with the setup with no dramas.
Previously I had a cage on standard rack but I only light stuff up there eg chairs etc


Have a good trip

Nick

[mike481082 Lurker Find all posts View Profile Close mike481082]

I run with 2 Rhino aero bars attached to the factory rails on my Prado with a 1500x1010 Rhino Allow tray fitted, it will fit a spare Tyre, but had to have maxtraxs sitting at an angle, although this worked quite well. I have just returned from NE South Oz and had no issues with the tray, the ARB awing I had fitted was another story.
Rhino does make a fitment kit for the ally trays onto the aero bars just can be hard to find on the website.

[Deeptank Senior Member Find all posts View Profile Close Deeptank]

I run with 2 Rhino aero bars attached to the factory rails on my Prado with a 1500x1010 Rhino Allow tray fitted, it will fit a spare Tyre, but had to have maxtraxs sitting at an angle, although this worked quite well. I have just returned from NE South Oz and had no issues with the tray, the ARB awing I had fitted was another story.
Rhino does make a fitment kit for the ally trays onto the aero bars just can be hard to find on the website.

I've got an almost identical setup with an Rhino 1500x1010 Rhino alloy tray on Rhino Aero bars, but they're mounted direct onto the Prado roof with Rhino mounts - so no Prado rails. I've had this for about three years now and not a single hitch!

Just completed a 4,100km trip with a huge Space Case (about 1.3m long) from ARB on the tray with my Black Wolf Turbo 240 tent in the Space Case, two gas bottles and an awning on the tray and all was as sweet as can be. At times I also had about 30-40kg of firewood on the rack (that's camping in NSW for you!) and it all worked axtremely well. All up I probably had around 100kg on the rack, which is a tad over what's recommended for off-roading by Rhino, yet no problems at all.

The tray and the bars are very strong, but as it's all alloy, I don't have to worry about rust issues encountered with steel and it's all a lot lighter too.

One mod I simply can't complain about... and being a grumpy old bastard, that says something! :-)