Eezi awn and African outback ideas

[jporter]

Guys,
I don't want to re-do the wheel. Anybody got any good ideas for quick mounts for an eezi awn tent to an AO rack? I don't mind loosening bolts, but squeezing my arm up under my rack to get to the bolts makes a 5 minute job take 45 minutes.
Thanks
Jason

 

[TemboTusk]

.

If you have the room; build a sub-frame that permanently bolts to bottom of the tent. Have the sub-frame stick out at either end of the tent. This will make bolting the sub-frame to the AO rack a bit easier.

The sub-frame can be rectangular steel tube 1/2" x 1.5" welded to desired dimensions.

.

 

[davegonz]

Front Runner makes some simple brackets for mounting RTT's to their Wind Cheetah racks. The racks are very similar to the AO in that they also have grooves/channels on the cross members to mount things. Check out campinglab.com or frontrunneroutfitters.com.

 

[jporter]

I have seen those and the quick release they make. I wanted like to incorporate the existing rails on the tent and not drill into the floor but I may end up mounting some extra 50" thule bars to the floor and clamping those to the rack.

 

[davegonz]

You can use the existing rails. I have a Camping Lab/Car-top-tent clone RTT and it has two aluminum rails that the brackets mount to. There's no need to drill new holes.

The rails look like this (not my picture).

 

[jporter]

Thats how I currently attach it to the AO rack. Problem is, the rails on an eezi awn do not extend to the edge like those in your pic, and I have to snake my arm under the flat rack to get to the bolts that secure the clamp. It is a real pita to get to them. I think I will end up adding cross bars at the edges.

Thanks for the responses.

 

[davegonz]

Ah, I see. You might want to replace the two extrusions with some longer ones like these from 80-20.

items in 80 20 8020 Aluminum T-Slot T Slot extrusion 8020 garage sale store on eBay!

 

[jporter]

Nice.

Thanks for the link.