? about car topping on a Subaru

U

uist1

New Member
Fellow Laser sailors... especially those who have car topped on a Subaru Outback (my is an '04 model year). I going to be moving cross country (1,800 miles) and wish to car top my Laser however the factory rack is only rated for a 100 pound load. Has anybody put the factory rack through its paces and if so, what kind of system was used (DIY, Thule, Yakima etc...)? Any tips or additional information would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks,

uist1
64650
 
I'm a wus. I have the same car and have never put more than 100 lbs on the roof...

Cheers,

Geoff S.
 
Beware of taking advice from just anyone!! The advice "at 56kg, Ive seen it done, should be fine" is given without thought for the consequences to life & property if the racks let go. 56kg is over 120 lb, and a very light bare hull! Plus there is alot of windage up there at highway speeds. What would be your insurance situation if you exceed the load specifiaction and the worst happened.
Get some racks that are rated for the job.
Alot of teenagers use TLF to "shoot the breeze" and have opinions on just about everything...for things sailing this is harmless enough, they might be good sailors, and hey try anything once, but your thread has more serious implications, would be a shame to damage such a nice vehicle, your Laser, or harm anyone in an accident! Happy travelling & sailing.
 
Re: ? about car topping

LaserLady said:
Beware of taking advice from just anyone!! ...
Get some racks that are rated for the job.
....Alot of teenagers use TLF to "shoot the breeze" and have opinions on just about everything...for things sailing this is harmless enough, they might be good sailors, and hey try anything once, but your thread has more serious implications, would be a shame to damage such a nice vehicle, your Laser, or harm anyone in an accident! Happy travelling & sailing.
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As a teenager, age 41,5 , driving my white 10 years old Ford-Escort-Combi with builder-supplied-cartop-rack for 75kg (160-180 lb?), I drive about 70 mph over the German-"Autobahn" (fast highway) with my cartopped Laser. And if I pass them, I nevver forgett to greet friendly this lame chopped-Porsche-Cayenne-TD-drivers with their 2000$-Byte-trailers in their back and the Alinghi/Oracle-hat on the drivers head..... :D

But now serious: I think a proved minimum 75 kg roof-rack, like Hariet told about, should be a must for a Laser-1-standard.(Thule is a very-very fine,but expensive supplier. I would prefer them, if I have not my original Ford ones). Don´t forget also about the wight for the mast and boom. Also very important these special flat NEW ratchet-ropes (sorry, I don´t know the English name for it), to get the hull very good fixed! I use 4.
In Germany, the police get you immediatley out of driving, if they see you did not fix your goods proper above the car roof...And they are right I think.
Cheers
LooserLu
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LaserLady said:
Beware of taking advice from just anyone!! The advice "at 56kg, Ive seen it done, should be fine" is given without thought for the consequences to life & property if the racks let go. 56kg is over 120 lb, and a very light bare hull! Plus there is alot of windage up there at highway speeds. What would be your insurance situation if you exceed the load specifiaction and the worst happened.
Get some racks that are rated for the job.
Alot of teenagers use TLF to "shoot the breeze" and have opinions on just about everything...for things sailing this is harmless enough, they might be good sailors, and hey try anything once, but your thread has more serious implications, would be a shame to damage such a nice vehicle, your Laser, or harm anyone in an accident! Happy travelling & sailing.
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Agree completely re: the advice.

You're in a grey area here. If you look at the owner's manual, the weight limit is probably not related to the rack itself, but to the design of the car. It's probably a limit imposed by cornering stability, meaning that changing the rack wouldn't fix the problem.

Then you need to figure out if the limit was set by engineers or by product liability lawyers, and in either case you need to figure out how much margin of safety there is.

My completely uninformed guess? Driving with a laser on a rack rated for 100 pounds is probably roughly equivalent to driving 65 miles per hour on a road with a "speed limit 55" sign. Not necessarily prudent, clearly a legal problem if you cause an accident, but not insanely outside the range of normal behavior, either.
 
My brother is a trained Subaru Technician and i was talking to him and he was saying that it will be fine, i agree with laserlady you must remember the windage factor so dont forget to strap the boat on well. If you are really worried about the ability of you roof racks put an after market set on rhino racks are very good ;) dont forget to point bow first to reduce drag lol. Plz laserlady if you have an issues with the ablity of the people posting take it up with them later thankyou we dont like flaming here i found out the hard way :'(
 
i just wish i could drive on the autobahns in germany like ludwig.....

overloading roof racks is just a bad idea, too much stuff can go wrong
 
aft looking what a Subaru Outback is, I say: you can come to our German Autobahn.:)

You will pass me on the left-lane (Germany has a "right-driving-system") at me (yes, Germany got a 2nd passing-lane on several highways) meanwhile I´m passing the Porsche. Don´t for get to greet me...;)

I think, the Subaru Outback, will carry your Laser very well, but get a better rack for it f.e.:Thule Rapid System 755 (for 100 kg good enough)
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Chiao
LooserLu
 

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My $.02 - 30+ years of cartopping with various cars and various racks (factory, home made, aftermarket), I have never had a problem with boats ripping racks off roofs, including Finns (265lbs hull wt) as long as I had a bow and stern line tied. Those lines are responsible for dealing with any areo lift that might be generated by having the hull on the racks. Don't rely just on the straps across the boat to the racks themselves, that's where you can run into trouble pulling the rack off the car. I've seen it before on both factory racks and aftermarket gutter racks.

I have seen factory racks collapse/compress, but the boats never came off, again with Finns on the roof. If you are worried, put a strap or two around the boat and thru the passenger compartment (we've all seen people carry 4'x8' sheets of plywood, mattresses, boats etc this way, with no rack at all), even if the rack were to completely fail, the roof would have to rip off before the boat let loose.
 
One other cartopping detail-be sure you have foam pads on your rack. The deck of the boat sinks into them as you crank tight on the straps holding it on, and it will stay very tight. I have carried a Laser, spars and dolly on top of a Honda Civic (with a Thule rack) for thousands of miles on the Interstate without incident. It just cuts down on my gas mileage a bit. I also use redundant tie-downs, so no piece is held by only one strap/line/shock cord, in case something fails or comes untied.
 
I have car topped many a Laser in my days but for only moderate distances. I always just throw it on top of my dad's '97 Isuzu Rodeo with the factory racks rated for 100 lbs.

One thing I have noticed with the factory racks are that when the tie down lines are not tight enough, when traveling at very high speeds, or when accelerating or decelerating rapidly, the bars will bend and flex slightly so we'll have to slow down until the boat steadies itself from its wobbling. This is not very efficient for traveling such a long distance.

Another thing that annoyed me was that the fectory racks have a bit of curvature in them. Since a Laser's deck also has some curvature to it, the amount of boat actually touching the rack was rediculoudly little.

Having said this, my advice:

Get yourself some Thule, Yakima or some other good quality racks and invest in some ratchet or similar straps to really crank it on there.

On another note, a great way to protect your boat is with some covers. If you don't already have some, look into picking some up to keep away those annoying rock and road debris.
 
macwas16 said:
Another thing that annoyed me was that the fectory racks have a bit of curvature in them. Since a Laser's deck also has some curvature to it, the amount of boat actually touching the rack was rediculoudly little.
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I noticed this problem on my Subaru Legacy wagon (same body and racks as the Outback). I also noticed that the curvature of the cross-bars was exactly the same as the thicknes of a 2x4 piece of lumber (i.e. a 2x4 layed across the rack like a crossbar was the same height at the center as the stock Subaru crossbar). So, I cut two 2x4's just longer than the width of car and tie them to the rack using the curved crossbars as fore-aft support. This gives me two nice flat 3 1/2 inch wide crossbars to support the load (in my case a DN iceboat). Cost: almost nothing.

I hope this makes sense. If not, I can take some photos and post them.

Cheers,

Geoff S.
 
macwas16 said:
...On another note, a great way to protect your boat is with some covers. If you don't already have some, look into picking some up to keep away those annoying rock and road debris.
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Yes, very true I think. Personally I did only one time travelled without the under-cover: The day I bought my old Laser and the former owener had no cover for me. The little pic in a reply from me above, is exact from that journey in last fall.

I made polyuretane-foam-isolation-tubes for heating-pipes (stronger ones than these 2 soft-foam-neoprene-tubes from Armacell/Armstrong!) round the traversal beams of my roof rack and did also duck-tape around that tubes. It´s a bit more expensive than the great solution Geoff described (I have to try that in my next vacations,soon :) ) but works also enough - especial in that moments, if I alone put my Laser up and down to the car. It´s a popular old-school-solution from the 70tis/80ties

Here are some other related threads about cartopping, I want to give hint to (maybe there are more):

http://laserforum.org/showthread.php?t=1266

http://laserforum.org/showthread.php?t=827

Bye-bye
LooserLu
[P.S.: Hariet, I afraid you are right ;) ...the age doesn´t matter...:D]
 
i think if you are unsure it may be a good idea to talk to a subaru dealer or customer service rep.
BTW i transport my boat on a box trailer with the boat tied down with rachet straps my spars just fit nicely tied with rope to the edge of the trailer
 
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