Shop Made Rack for Toyota

rwm

Robert
H-M Lifetime Diamond Member
Joined
Mar 25, 2013
Messages
4,606
I am planning to make a roof rack for my Sequoia. I would like to use factory made load bars but make my own mounts for these. I am posting here because I am sure all y'all have a good deal of collective experience with car racks and the like. Below are some criteria and issues:

The car has raised roof rails like many others. I could buy the aftermarket (Thule, Yakima) plastic clamps that attach to these. They are kind of ugly and look, well, aftermarket. My plan is to fabricate brackets that go into the existing rail slots and then mount a factory bar to these.

Noise is a critical consideration. I see that Thule and Rhino make load bars with vortex generators that claim to quite the wind noise. Does any one have experience/confirmation of this? Is there a better item I should be looking at?
Rhino:

1664026286086.png
Thule truck bar:
1664026297269.png

I need a bar that is about 70" long to accommodate multiple kayaks.
I will have a lot of questions about spacer material and fasteners to get this right the first time so I hope you will chime in with comments, criticism and helpful experience.
One would think a roof rack would be a simple venture however, I have built a roof rack previously. It ended up being noisy. Years later when I went to remove it, the stainless screws had welded to the aluminum parts due to galvanic corrosion and I had to cut the thing off the vehicle! Lets do better this time.
 
Stock Sequoia image. You can see the rails.

1664026950836.png
 
what a coincidence! I'm making a rack for my new-to-me Toyota Tundra (or rather re-making old racks that fit a Ford F250 - from 1987).

I'm looking for a topper for it, and the Leer (for instance) has these Rhino-style t slots embedded in the roof of the topper. I may have to go commercial for my racks, time will tell. I'll be following your journey closely!
 
  • Like
Reactions: rwm
I have a friend who has the Thule bars. I am going to duct tape them to my rails and run them at 120mph on I85 to see the noise level. ( I will still be the slowest car in the left lane.) FYI I wanted a Tundra but it wont fit in the garage.
 
Borrowed a Thule load bar for noise testing:

1664373035266.png
1664373066867.png

This is a little too noisy on the highway. You can hear it whistle above 50 mph of so. Not optimal. I need to try a smaller bar. I think the 72" bar length looks about right.

I ordered the Rhino bar shown above. I will noise test that when I get it. E Trailer is great to deal with.
 
Last edited:
the whistle is likely coming from the end of the bar: If you duct tape over the open end you well get a different sound profile.
Pictures of my new rack coming soon!
 
I can't help but wonder if there is a better option from an aerospace extrusion that might be better?

That said, I was thinking looking at this: https://parco-inc.com/tslot-aluminum-extrusions/

That perhaps that E1050S or E2012S with a more aggressive round-over (woodworking router table?) might be a better/cheaper solution?

AS far as Aerospace, I found these extrusions:

You lose the T-slot, but I suspect you could just do a set of bolt holes and use those instead? They are quite a bit more expensive, but would be DRASTICALLY better aerodynamically, they are designed to not be terribly noisy (that is, aerodynamically) at speeds in excess of 100 MPH.

An additional idea, the webbing on those seems reasonably thick (~120 thou at minimum, on the small struts, others are all slightly bigger), so I wonder if you could just do extended 'keyholes' instead, so you could get the head of a carriage bolt/etc into them?

IF it were me, I'd be incredibly tempted by the "Jury Struts". Its somewhat reasonably priced ($50 for a 6 foot bar), would be aerodynamically wonderful, and has a pretty thick webbing.
 
the whistle is likely coming from the end of the bar: If you duct tape over the open end you well get a different sound profile.
Pictures of my new rack coming soon!
That bar has factory plastic end caps on it.

I like those aircraft extrusions.

Doug- if you take the label off that 2 x 4 I think it will be a lot quieter.

I have ordered the Rhino Rack load bar so I will see how that fares.
 
All bars make objectionable noise except some factory cross bars due to their cross section but then they lack rigidity/strength.

Thule used to have some mounts that you could install or remove in under 2 mins. Unfortunately they don’t have them anymore as they were not stylish enough.
 
Back
Top