My attempt at rack bars

[Bikeflyer]

I decided after a trip to home depot to get lumber that I needed some bars to tie to on my 05. Capitalizing on stock I already had, here is what I came up with....
It is composed of 1 inch diameter galvanized conduit. The fasteners are tractor hitch pins of the size to fit the pre-drilled holes in the factory rack. I simply opened the holes to the bottom of the rack, drilled the conduit to match and voila, a crossbar set. It is not as rigid as the factory sets, but it doesn't cost 100 bucks and It really is not bad. I suspended the bar between saw horses and couldnt make it flex noticably. For a plywood/2x4 lumber occasionally carrier, its plenty and only took about an hour's labor.

 

[kj924]

Looks good, I used 1" square steel stock for mine...about $10 and a couple hours of my time.

 

[Drucifer]

Looks dangerous to me. Why so long?

 

[Bikeflyer]

Actually they are still within the footprint of the doors, so its not all that wide. I wanted to have some projection to wrap the ropes around, as well as a bit more tolerance for wider items like plywood. I just hauled a big roll of carpet today and it worked great. With the projections it took all of 2 minutes to tie it all down, which was good because it was raining buckets at the time

 

[sport]

Maybe put some caps on the ends to protect from walking head first into them. Looks good.

 

[Powerslave]

This is what I had planned on doing... I posted about this last month, to use the holes that are already in there, but drill the bottom parts out, and use stainless square tube. I see someone DID finally do it with other material, and it looks just fine. No front or back adjustments, but it will work.

 

[kb0nly]

Do all model years have those holes?? I don't remember seeing any on my 03' but i will look again!

 

[Powerslave]

Do all model years have those holes?? I don't remember seeing any on my 03' but i will look again!

If you have them, they would be on the TOP of the rails, towards the FRONT, and towards the BACK. The bottom is not holed, only the top part. So, you just drill through to the bottom, ad bolt some nice rails on.

 

[Drucifer]

Maybe put some caps on the ends to protect from walking head first into them. Looks good.

I agree. Because when you are parked by a sidewalk, those bars are around my eye level.

 

[Bikeflyer]

I already planned on rubber caps, so I found some rubber "furniture feet" today. They are kinda like what goes on crutches and foot stools and such. White Btw for visibility. Instead of bolts I opted for pins for easier install/removal(like on highway trips where I don't want the drag). A little bit of rattle on gravel roads but not really that bad.