Any recommendations on a gutter mount ladder rack?

[landtank]

I have a hanabal and love it for all kinds carrying needs. It has a removeable rear fence so long ladders and stock aren't a problem. With the fence you can stack plywood and other 4x8 sheet material up there with no worries. I realise they are on the expensive side but I'vehad a crap load of building material up there with no issues that I'm aware of.

 

[mooker82]

I really like the yakimas too. Ive had mine for years and they have taken some serious straining without breaking. We have had 8 whitewater kayaks stacked on thme doing 70 on the interstate with no problems. If you figure 40 -50 LBS a kayak that 320-400 lbs. Heres an old picture with the 1A's.

 

[cruiser88]

confer

 

[Rookie2]

I've got the Yakima A1 guttermount brackets with 78" cross bars and haul two 80 lb canoes regularly with no problem. Picked up the guttermount brackets with lock set off ebay for $26. They seem very stout to me, and I don't believe any of the main parts of the housing or clamp to be plastic. You should at least take a look at a set. I'm pretty sure you'll find they're up to the task. Also have the gunwale brackets and they work very well too. I'll check the OD on the cross bars when I get home later. Let me know if you need anything else measured up on them.


Rookie2

 

[Rookie2]

As best I could measure, the OD on the Yakima cross bar is 1.107". You're right, the housing for the A1 towers are plastic, but the ring the cross bars go through are pretty thick alluminum and the piece that clamps the gutter is steel.


Rookie2

 

[aim]

I carried a load of cherry boards on my Yakima bars (78"? 80"?) with LoadStops. 14' long boards, a pile 60" wide by several boards tall. Dirt roads, interstate, etc. A pair of of ratchet straps to tighten everything down. As long as the mounts are tightened well, they are incredibly stout.

 

[Cruisin'Carolina]

A-1 are not plastic. Rubber coated, maybe, but metal.

They will not fail you.

 

[John E Davies]

I have a Yakima Tower system and it is really stout. However, for a loooong load like a 12 foot (collapsed) ladder it is smart to widen the spacing of the bars to the absolute maximum. Since you want to also carry shorter stuff why not install three crossbars at about 3 foot intervals. Those plus gunwale brackets would be dandy. The forward bar could ride just in front of the sunroof with a fairing. I think it would look cool.

You could remove the front bar and install bike trays or whatever to carry toys on the weekend.

In that pic the bars at set at 48 inches, with the fairing located just behind the sunroof. You can't really see them, but Yakima gunwale brackets are stabilizing the shovel.

John Davies
Spokane WA

 

[semlin]

one more vote for the yakima towers. I have two sets of A1 towers with cross bars and they are plenty beefy. i know you can get the right size pipe for the cross bars from home depot up here. I would take your tower to home depot and trial fit it.

 

[RavenTai]

Update,

After a false start finally got the 7" "quik-n-easy" mounts, the 4" ones would have been nice and low fitting the 80 better but the 24' ladder would have to sit way foreword to clear the lift gate air deflector and wiper when the lift gate is open. If I were to do a basket rack I would source the 4" "quik-n-easy" mounts even though they are harder to find.

The cross bars are made from .75" ID, 1.05 OD steel tube, a buddy welded some iron spheres in the ends to close them out and get rid of the sharp edges, had a local machine shop turn down the ends taking out the excess weld and about 4" at each end of the tube to fit the mounts (about 1.01")

I painted the cross bars and safety-wired the mount latches to keep kids & passerby’s from playing with the latches.

The mounts were about $100, I tried a much cheaper source but they flaked on me causing me down time and therefore money.

The a 20" stick of steel cut to transportable size and 8 spheres was ~$30

Machine work was $40

I am happy with this rack, quite sturdy and so far has survived 5K miles of Atlanta traffic, freeways, emergency braking, dirt roads and pot holes with no loosening or shifting, ratchet strapping the ladders to the rack holds them in place just fine without gunwale mounts but the ladders are taking a toll on the paint on top of the cross bars, I need to repaint them and cover them with some plastic spiral wrap before rust sets in.

I lost about 1.5 MPG, getting about 13.5 now, witch is annoying as I am putting 1K a week on it. Some of that is from increased idling time and city driving that I was not doing before on my mostly freeway commute.

Body roll from high mounted weight and push from cross winds are more noticeable now,

So how do you get rid of that howl? I have seen some ladders with expanding foam in the ends of the crossbars, they say that works, just worried about water getting trapped inside, I was thinking about speed tape (aluminum tape rated for about 600 MPH) any other options?

P.S. although it does the task quite well there is something wrong with using a Lexus as a work truck, I got a lot of funny looks and comments. Hopefully this will only be temporary.

 

[bdg4512]

Duct Tape is probably cheaper. In WWII it was called "100 MPH Tape" because they used it to patch bullet holes in planes. If it worked for the U.S. Army, it'll work for you! Haha!

 

[RavenTai]

Duct Tape is probably cheaper.

so is the string from a tea bag but what good would it have done me?


we have some 500MPH tape, sticks fine for temporary fix of dents and alike but would not hold anything of any weight, it tears easily like duct tape does.

 

[stayalert]

way to go! I a a huge fan of Q-n-E's

 

[Rookie2]

way to go! I a a huge fan of Q-n-E's

You need to toss those foam blocks and get some gunwale brackets. They're nice... pretty much lock the canoe in from moving side to side or front to back.


Rookie2