OK, you convinced me, I pulled the factory roof rack....

[super90]

.....and overall, I was lucky, I guess. Of the eight bolts on the main rack, six came out without a hitch, on the other two, I dripped PB Blaster in there for a couple of days, and they came loose. Both of these were the long bolts on the front end.

OK, rack is off, and yes, what a crappy way to bolt that thing on ! I only have a little bit of rust bubbling up around the two holes on the front right. I guess I'll try and put some phosphoric acid on there to see if we can stop the rust. I don't know what exactly to do, but, I am thinking the path of least resistance is to stop the rust and put the rack back on, sealing things up much better than when the thing was attached. Even if I have strip the paint and fix the rust, the foot of the rack should cover that spot and no one will be the wiser.

If money were not an issue, I'd have the holes plugged and the roof re-painted, but a $1k for that doesn't seem like a good use of money right now. I agree the rack is a POS, but I am not out to solve world hunger, just prevent the roof of my truck from rusting anymore.

What an annoying issue.


Robert

 

[TX_TLC]

What color is your truck? I will post pictures of my nylon auto fasener and black silicone fix tomorrow. It is very un-noticable on my dark green. Glad you didn't have many problems!

 

[OZCAL]

Here's my fix, which was based on most nutserts being shot or threatening to fail and a litle surface rust. Ugly but cheap, and fun to take a Dremel to a Lexus . Had I had more time I was going to stencil my son's footprint a la "Hang Ten" and use it for the pattern. I think TYLER first suggested a custom creative stencil. I pinched the rosette washer idea from CruiserDan, I think.

What you see is an approx. 3"x5" patch of Herculiner, brushed over the footprint (read "scar") of the roofrack after I removed the nutserts, dremeled smooth the nutsert holes and covered them with a few layers of metal tape.

I knew I was never putting a rack back on using the nutserts, so I abandoned them. You can also see one of the nutserts at the end of a rib-rail, which was not rusty and thus I have only sealed it with silicone and inserted a rubber lined rosette washer and a marine grade stainless steel screw.

On another 93 LC I found no rust whatsoever and did something similar to the rosette washer treatment throughout. This was a long time ago and I was not even concerned with rust on that truck; I merely wanted to get it into parking garages.

David

 

[T Y L E R]

David, looks nice dude !

Do you have a pic from the side at about 10' out. I have a feeling that guys like us that go this route will just have to deal with the Line-x being seen from the side, because of the natural slope of the roof line.


I think I'll still Line-x the 4 longitudinal stretches so that if I ever encounter one of those height marking bars for underground access in BC, it will grind off of the Line-x and not my paint....makes it pretty important to hand at least a couple continuous strips of the product from bow to stern .. at least over the high points.


TY

 

[OZCAL]

David, looks nice dude !

Do you have a pic from the side at about 10' out. I have a feeling that guys like us that go this route will just have to deal with the Line-x being seen from the side, because of the natural slope of the roof line.


I think I'll still Line-x the 4 longitudinal stretches so that if I ever encounter one of those height marking bars for underground access in BC, it will grind off of the Line-x and not my paint....makes it pretty important to hand at least a couple continuous strips of the product from bow to stern .. at least over the high points.


TY

Thanks - hey, that was you that was going to do a stencil, wasn't it?

Here's the best picture I could find. The LX is in California, and I'm in QLD, so I can't take any more until summer. I left the ribs on the roof for protection, and also because I ran out of time before getting around to peeling them off.

You can barely see the four patches and you can see one of the rib-rail nutserts that had to be patched as well.

David

 

[T Y L E R]

I was me yes .. I think keeping the protection on is a good idea. Perhaps you can remove when you have the time and go with the spray there as well. I'd hate to see that foam start holding moisture and causing rust to appear.

I just have to figure out a stencil for where the rack feet were. Something rectangular shaped in general, such a footprint would be cool. Might alleviate my OCD need to have utter symmetry on the 80. Was worried about how I'd manage to tape off identical sized areas up there....if I go with a free style stencil, I might gain the freedom to have ... a little ... fun ?





TY

 

[OZCAL]

Yes the ribrails will come off eventually; I was honestly afraid to pull on them any harder than I did, and ran out of time before we had to boogie back down to Queensland. I've thought it might be a good idea to put an ID number up there, maybe the license plate - in giant Line-X letters - kind of a theft deterrent, if a potential thief knew it was up there... But it would probably just make it easier for highway patrol planes to write me speeding tickets .

David

 

[super90]

Truck is White

TX_TLC,

I know you mentioned you fasteners where black, I think. I am sure someone makes a white version.

Still on the fence as to whether to clean up rust , put down some pads and replace the rack, or plug the holes and live with the ugly spots where the paint is all screwed up do to some idiot putting those plastic feet directly on the roof. Arrggggghhhhh.

There is no possible way that this attachment was going to go long without rusting. It's just a bad design, period.

FYI, I am sure you have noticed, but there is a lot less wind noise without the rack up there.

Keep the Cruiser Faith,

Robert

 

[TX_TLC]

Here is fix. I have yet to address the jacked up paint...but like the look of that line-x.

One looking down and one profile. To get a snug fit I ended up popping the 6 nutserts that didn't come off with the rack, out of the roof.

 

[stuck in GA]

I like the idea of stenciled linex on the top where you have rust spots. That could look cool with a couple of footprints on top or something. I got mine sealed and repainted and it wasn't a grand and they did a good job. But I think for the cheap application I would do the herculiner patches or something along those lines.

 

[super90]

Josh,

If you don't mind me asking, what did it cost to have them sealed and fixed?

 

[super90]

TX_TLC,

Remind me again how these nylon fasteners work? Do they screw into the nutserts or do you just "jam" them in there?

 

[TX_TLC]

They have "fins" that allow them to be pushed in, but then the fins expand once inserted and it is secure. I used black silicone to seal them as well.

 

[Darwood]

I got mine sealed and repainted and it wasn't a grand and they did a good job.

Curious I am, did they remove the headliner and weld the holes shut, or did they just put sealer over the holes West Coast Customs style?

 

[Brentbba]

Curious I am, did they remove the headliner and weld the holes shut, or did they just put sealer over the holes West Coast Customs style?

ROTFLMAO! hehehe that's good!

 

[Rookie2]

Of the eight bolts on the main rack, six came out without a hitch, on the other two, I dripped PB Blaster in there for a couple of days, and they came loose.

Okay... so how did this work?? You started to remove these, they began to spin, then you added PB Blaster and they came loose?

How did you apply the PB Blaster, couple drops on the screw head and let it run down and soak in?

Thanks,
Rookie2

 

[OZCAL]

Okay... so how did this work?? You started to remove these, they began to spin, then you added PB Blaster and they came loose?

How did you apply the PB Blaster, couple drops on the screw head and let it run down and soak in?

Thanks,
Rookie2

Just a note here - when I tried breaking up the rust between my screws and nutserts, some WD-40 leaked around the nutserts and left some tell-tale "amateur marks" in the headliner directly below . Don't use more than a drop or so...

David

 

[super90]

Nope, I was able to loosen the other bolts, but these two were not breaking loose with the same about of "torque" on the screwdriver. I didn't force them, but did put a drop or two of PB blaster on the screw heads and it slowly fed below the head. I also was a little "agressive" in that I put the screwdrive on the screw and gave it a few "love taps" with a light hammer. Not a whack, but really a few solid taps.

I let everything sit for a day and did it again the next day. On day three, the screws came loose.

R.