Re: [Paddlewise] Car topping -- bow/stern tie-down

At 09:50 AM 5/23/2003 -0700, Emile Zen wrote:
>Dave Gorjup <dgorjup_at_cox.net> wrote:
>the roof rack alone, on my Olds mini-van, is not adequate for holding a
>kayak by itself. They can rip right off the roof.
>
>Thanks for the warning.  So what happens if your car has those 
>aerodynamic-looking bumpers, affixed to the body to appear contiguous, and 
>there is nothing to tie down to?  I think I missed one of the replies to 
>this inquiry.
>
>Emile
>
Just a couple of further remarks on tie-downs.

I mentioned earlier that I installed front and rear tie-downs for my '97 
Dodge Caravan.  I want to mention that I also have a factory rack to which 
I have fastened a Yakima rack with saddles forward and rollers aft.  The 
roof rack is my primary tie-down point and my bow and stern lines are 
secondary tie-downs.  When securing the boats, I snug down the roof 
tie-downs relatively tightly.  The bow and stern lines have just the tinest 
bit of slack.

Before I had my '97 Caravan, I had a'88 Caravan.  During its life, it 
developed a leak in the roof (turned out to be a spot of missing caulk in 
the rain gutter).  While chasing this leak, I had occasion to remove the 
roof liner and I was shocked to see how the roof rack was attached to the 
vehicle.  There were press-thru nuts on the inside that didn't even have 
the bearing area of hex nuts.  Forget washers.  It didn't bother me too 
much then because the rack I used for that car used the rain gutters 
(remember them :-)  ?).  When I purchased the '97, I had a long telephone 
chat with an engineer in Detroit.  The '97 attach method had improved over 
the '88 enough so that I was willing to use the factory rack to attach the 
boats.  I use the Yakima rack with the factory rack more because it 
provides a better way to HOLD the boats themselves.

Maybe this is all more than you wanted to know.  At any rate there were a 
lot of discussions here on Paddlewise on tying boats to racks that should 
be in the archives.

Bill Leonhardt 
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