17 replies to this topic

[steve33]

Would this sort of foam block set up, directly on the roof, be okay or would it have any chance of damaging the camper? My kayak is a whitewater boat, only weights roughly 30 pounds, maybe a 35 with some of the gear (throw rope, water bottle, yada yada) inside. 

 

I bought the camper used and it did not come with a rack or the yakima rails. 

Thanks. 

[Casa Escarlata Robles Too]

Without a rack to attach the tiedowns to it might be a problem.

I have a rack on my Bobcat and made a special "track" so I could carry a 13' fiberglass canoe about 60#.

That attached to the factory rack and worked well.

If you could figure some sort of "eye" bolt through the roof to attach the tiedowns to that might work,but that means going through the roof at the roof frame area.

The weight isn't an issue.

Frank

[steve33]

Thanks for that. 

I figured I would tie down directly to the truck. Rear tie down to the trailer hitch. Front either to under the hood (not ideal) or maybe better wrap around the front of the camper and underneath and down to the truck bed. Would have to detach to lift camper roof- bit of  a pain maybe. 

[Casa Escarlata Robles Too]

That would be a bit of a pain.

Maybe the idea of 4 "eye" bolts through a roof frame and sealed well might be a better solution.

Or make a factory style roof rack.

Using just the front bar style,front/rear.

Good luck.

Frank

[Alley-Kat]

I've used something like that on my old '72 Ford Bronco. Home made and worked well, however, I did tie the kayaks to the front bumper, as well as the gutter tie downs that I made.

 

- - - - - - - - - - - - - -

 

For the pop-up truck camper, I use this bracket that I bolted through the "C" channel that goes around the cab-over section of the front of my All Terrain Camper Bobcat. Very sturdy. FWC's are built the same. 

 

I just leave the kayaks attached to the tie down strap and remove the tie down strap from the bracket to raise the roof. I do have the gas shock lifters and often use the crank up speaker stand to raise the roof with up to 4 kayaks on the roof.

 

I do have the Yakama track and the two Thule racks that I use to tie down the other areas of the kayaks with nothing holding the rear of the kayaks. I've probably done about 40,000 miles this way on various pavements at slightly lower than freeway speeds and lots and lots of dirt roads of various conditions. I usually drive slow, I'm in no hurry, ever.

 

One bracket in the front would work. And, you may think about using two of them on each side of the camper, for a total of five brackets.

 

 

I had to buy 10 of these brackets and I think I have maybe half of them left in the garage after selling a couple to other WTW forum members. It may take a little time to locate them as the garage is in a state of disarray thanks to a recently evicted brother-in-law.

 

They were $5 each, and I can probably ship up to 5 of them for another $7.

If you want any, just let me know how many.

Unless you're in a hurry, I prefer to receive a check or postal money order in the mail.

We can do the address exchange via a Private Message.  

 

Or, see what you can find on the internet that might do the same type of job.

Edited by Alley-Kat, 20 May 2017 - 07:40 PM.

[steve33]

That's a great suggestion. Thanks. 

I don't have the gas struts and my FWC does have the threaded receivers for the struts. I wonder if I could run a bar between those two spots, bolted to the gas strut locations, and use that for tiedowns. Could do front and rear. 

Come to think of it, if I used the threaded receivers on the top of the camper (ie on the pop top) I would not have to take the straps off to raise the roof. 

Hmmm....

[Alley-Kat]

Might work, however, I'd say ask FWC about the shear strength of using those mounts.

Some FWC guys (only a few, I think have mentioned it on WTW) are seeing tear-outs of the screws in normal use of the gas shocks.

 

Lots of wind pressure on anything mounted to the top and tied down to the camper.

I'd want do a through bolt on the "C" channel.

Maybe those gas shock, threaded receivers can be done that way?

 

EDIT: OK, now that I think about it, the top of the gas shock threaded brackets are screwed into the edge of the roof, where you can't easily get access on the inside of the camper to do a through bolt because of the headliner material. Check with FWC about using them for the purpose you are thinking about. My guess is don't do it that way.

Edited by Alley-Kat, 20 May 2017 - 08:11 PM.

[DavidGraves]

Howdy

 

If your camper has the corner jack brackets how about just adapting a kayak stacker to them ?

 

Maybe best on the passenger side of rig.

 

Carrying on the side would make loading and such much easier.

 

I see surf boards and fold boats carried this way a lot in our area.

 

Not sure whether you want to carry the kayak hundreds of miles or just to your local lake.

 

David Graves

[steve33]

Lots of miles/trips. It's a white water boat so probably a bit to deep to stack on the side of a vehicle I'm afraid.

Good tips on the strut mounts. I'll have a look and make some inquiries. 

[buckland]

Totally off the top of my head but David says the jack brackets are your strong points.... If you made a clamping set-up from there that swiveled over half the roof... you could carry and still pop up after unloading.  Would take good engineering but ....where there is a will...