03 Forester roof rack crossbars & bike carriers

What bike carriers go on the factory crossbars?

I've got a couple of Thule carriers, and a Rockymounts carrier, and if I could adapt either, it would be nice.

The factory crossbars don't seem that strong, but probably strong enough, and they're quiet. Quieter than Thule or Yak bars. I did a Google Groups search, but the only way I found people to mounting Thule carriers on the roof was by using Thule crossbars. I'd rather carry the bikes inside or off a hitch than have noisy crossbars on the roof all the time.

What mounts to the Subaru bars? What are they for?

Thanks, David

Reply to
David
Loading thread data ...

Hey David,

I have an '03 Baja. I mounted my Thule parts onto the Subaru rack using the front Thule bar and additional parts that amounted to maybe $20 from Thule. I've had it on since March '03 and its been great. Subaru does offer their own line of racks but i'm pretty sure their manufactured for Subaru by Thule/Yakima anyways. I'd suggest plugging your vehicle's info into Thule's site and looking at the schematics/parts requirements to take care of your Scoobie. Just figure out what you need from that and order 'em up! :-)

Reply to
Le Bernadin

the other bars that are well worth a look at Rhino Racks...

formatting link

Reply to
Andrew Morris

Thx for the info. All I found on the Thule site was a couple of $155 carriers complete with an adapter kit to fit the Sube bars. I wouldn't spend $155/bike to carry bikes on the roof (although I guess I've spent more in the past), and I hope to not need to carry anything that requires Thule or Yak bars. I would spend a little to buy adapters for my existing carriers. I'll see if REI or Sportsrack can sell me the adaptor kit. If not, I'll probably build a 2-bike carrier for inside (two fork-mounts + a board), and if I ever need to carry 3 people & bikes, I guess I'd go to hitch-mount.

Reply to
David

"David" wrote in news:bt615d$3akja$ snipped-for-privacy@ID-189417.news.uni-berlin.de:

Oh, i thought you already had a Thule rack system to start with as i did. If you already have the Velo Vise Fork Mounts and the Load Bar you can just order the spare parts as i did. I just looked it up and the $155 is if you were starting from scratch. Click on the product manual and spare parts links on that same page.

Reply to
Le Bernadin

My 03 Forester stock Subaru kayak carrier is actually made by Yakima. Says so right on it. The mounts might be specific to Subaru, but maybe they're also originally from Yakima.

Given that Subaru probably gets most of its rack stuff from the established maufacturers, it would be worth comparison shopping name brands vs. Subaru. Subaru prices are pretty reasonable at some of the Web sites, but the name brands seem to want to keep their prices and image up pretty high.

Forester crossbars are rated at 150 lb, vs the other models, which are lower (75?).

David wrote:

Reply to
BBB

I've had Yakima crossbars on my '01 and '03 OBWs for several years, and they are pretty quiet. I did get the small, cheap Yakima "wind wing" that snaps over the bars, and it did an amazing job of quieting any residual noise. I was surprised that it worked so well!

Reply to
Brian Wasson

MotorsForum website is not affiliated with any of the manufacturers or service providers discussed here. All logos and trade names are the property of their respective owners.