Roof top cargo carriers...

[3 ladybugs]

We are going down to Florida at Thanksgiving again this year and plan to pick up my mom and step father and drive from St. Pete to the Keys. Last year we did this and camped, this year we are staying in a villa type thing. 

 

Anyway, I figure the best way to accommodate us all in one car is to get something for the roof of our van. DH is terrified of the idea, but I figure they are safe if installed correctly. I am looking at the ones at Sears, as I don't want to spend $500 for one. Is there any really difference in them other then the size? If you have one, is there something that you wish you would have known about that didn't? Do these really ever go on fantastic sales? I really don't need it till November, though we might be able to use it in one trip that we have planned between now and then. 

 

Thanks for the help!

[sarahbobeara]

I love ours. We have a Yakima Rocketbox, although I'm not sure what model.  It's wider and shorter and I can install/remove it myself on top of our Odyssey. It's a must when all 5 of us travel together (the dogs in their kennel take up room on the interior). We put stuff up there that we're not going to need until our destination...usually snow boots, heavy winter stuff we probably won't need while we're driving all day. We've never had it leak from the top or the bottom. I have fears of the wind catching it and our stuff spread all over the interstate, but it hasn't happened!  It's very secure, and I've traveled cross country with them, no problem. We've had a Thule and it was also very secure, but it was a 2-man job due to it's size and we 'gifted' it to a neighbor before our last move.

 

The only problem is storage when we're not using it. I wish we had a garage with some sort of overhead rack system but we don't. Because we use it so often and put the $$$ into it, it does get stored in the garage. My parents stored their carrier (from Sears) outside and it only lasted a few years due to weathering. 

 

I've also done the soft sided carrier (roof bag or something like that). I was a lot more nervous about that one, I felt like we needed more bungee cords and I ended up putting our gear in garbage bags before packing it because I was worried about stuff getting wet. It stayed dry, but I've only used it for one trip...it seemed less secure because it didn't have a keyed lock, although you could probably zip tie it or put a small padlock on it to deter snoopers. 

[Forget-Me-Not]

I have a Thule that has been great. A local place price-matched an Internet deal for me, so we got it for around $450

 

My advice would be to spend the extra money to get one with mounting hardware pre-installed. The lowest priced ones involve putting a U-shaped clamp around your racks and up through the box, then bolting them from inside (a two-person job). My mid-grade one has "claws" that tighten around the rack and are tightened from inside. It's really fast and easy to install.

Edited July 15, 2016 by Forget-me-not

[gardenmom5]

we bought one at sears about 30 years ago.  we still have it, but dont' use it nearly as much as when we had everyone at home.

 

we also have a roof rack - so we would attach it to that. wrap the straps to prevent them from flapping.  they come with locks.  it can be really hard to get stuff from the far side.

 

we lent it to one family who hadn't wanted to make the plunge - when they came back, he was like "why did we wait?"  (a neighbor of ours was getting rid of one, so he was able to pick that up for super cheap.)

 

eta: we're in a temperate climate, and it has always been stored in our unfinished basement or garage. it takes two people to move it/get it on the roof.  it can be disassembled to store the bottom inside the top.

Edited July 15, 2016 by gardenmom5

[SparklyUnicorn]

My thought is this must work only for tall people.  I'm not tall people.  Are you tall people?  LOL

 

 

[3 ladybugs]

We are fairly tall but we can also get a step ladder if need be. ;)

 

We have an "attic" in our shed so we can keep it there. 

 

Love the advice so far! Keep it coming! 

[NorthwestMom]

My thought is this must work only for tall people.  I'm not tall people.  Are you tall people?  LOL

 

We have a Thule we put on top of an Odyssey. It is huge and heavy. I am 5'1 and I can certainly NOT get it up there alone (I think it always takes 2 people no matter their size), but I also struggle to reach to get things in and out of it. I stand on the edge of the floor of the van, sliding door open, and i can reach about 1/3 of the way into the cargo bin. Honestly, this doesn't really bother me. DH and DS can be in charge of that job anyway. I do enough. I'm glad my shortness got me out of doing something for once.

 

After we had the cargo bin for one week, I drove it inside a parking garage because I totally forgot it was there. It was damaged from the low ceilings in the garage and had to be repaired to make it weatherproof again. I now pause every time before driving into a parking garage to confirm I don't have it on the roof.

 

Overall, it has been convenient for our family, but If I had to deal with it on my own it would not be possible.

[SparklyUnicorn]

We have a Thule we put on top of an Odyssey. It is huge and heavy. I am 5'1 and I can certainly NOT get it up there alone (I think it always takes 2 people no matter their size), but I also struggle to reach to get things in and out of it. I stand on the edge of the floor of the van, sliding door open, and i can reach about 1/3 of the way into the cargo bin. Honestly, this doesn't really bother me. DH and DS can be in charge of that job anyway. I do enough. I'm glad my shortness got me out of doing something for once.

 

After we had the cargo bin for one week, I drove it inside a parking garage because I totally forgot it was there. It was damaged from the low ceilings in the garage and had to be repaired to make it weatherproof again. I now pause every time before driving into a parking garage to confirm I don't have it on the roof.

 

Overall, it has been convenient for our family, but If I had to deal with it on my own it would not be possible.

 

I'm your same height.  I doubt I could pull this off.  And a step ladder?  No way.  How can someone stand on a step ladder and hang onto something awkward and heavy?  Sounds nuts.

 

But not everyone is as short so...

[hornblower]

We have a fabric roof top carrier that we use for camping road trips because our van is filled with dogs and there's little room for tents and sleeping bags. 
It's lasted well for many years; no rips or snags. If you might be driving in rain, then yeah, I'd bag everything carefully in plastic inside it. Ours is like heavy duty canvas and treated with some rubber-like substance inside but I wouldn't trust it for a big rain fall. 

The advantage to ours is that when you don't need it, you can pack it back up. It fits in a small box - smaller than a filing box. 

[Wheres Toto]

We have a hard-sided S Cargo from Sears.  We've had it for about 10 years I think.  We store it outside or inside our garage (depending on how messy the garage is) or just leave it on top of our Suburban (and avoid parking garages).  Dh loads it by standing on the back bumper, or one foot on a tire and one foot on the window.  I would have to use a ladder.  We usually store light-weight stuff up there - sleeping bags and pillows, carry-on size luggage, or similar.  

 

We did have it crack at one point and dh fixed it using some kind of hardening putty/polymer stuff. 

 

The main difficulty is remembering to not go in parking garages or similar low-clearance situations.  This probably isn't an issue with all vehicles but with this extra 3 feet on top of the Suburban, it makes a difference.

[Erica in OR]

The main difficulty is remembering to not go in parking garages or similar low-clearance situations.  This probably isn't an issue with all vehicles but with this extra 3 feet on top of the Suburban, it makes a difference.

 

Agree with this. We typically use our Yakima carrier on our Toyota Sienna, with few worries. We got hardware to mount it on our Ford Excursion this summer and we couldn't go through the fast food drive-throughs anymore. :) Plus, you have to watch handling. When traveling at high interstate speeds and going through curves, the handling was much less stable.

 

That said, there's no way we could survive without a carrier on road trips. Never any problem in over 10 years.

 

My husband can muscle the thing up to the roof, but it's easier if one of the kids helps him. Ours opens on the side and the lid pops open, so we stand in a side door and load it from there, preferably with a helper handing up the heaviest items.

 

Erica in OR

[3 ladybugs]

Well I just looked where we parked last time in Key West and it wouldn't fit with our car. However there is other parking lots that are open top there so that might work. We don't eat in fast food places often when we travel, when we do they are normally at truck stops. 

 

I am not seeing that 2 inches in height will make a HUGE difference in anything other then capacity so I think I will aim for the larger one, but I will have to keep my eye on price through the summer. 

[MEmama]

My thought is this must work only for tall people. I'm not tall people. Are you tall people? LOL

A little bit different but with a similar challenge...we are not tall people, and just got a roof rack bike carrier because our trunk mounted carrier can't handle 3 road bikes. It is absolutely not the ideal solution for us but the only one we have with our current cars. We will have to take a step stool every time we use it. Ridiculous for sure, and annoying for me because there is no way I could load it, but it is what it is. At least it is easy to remove so I don't have to panic every time I park in the garage.

[Suzanne in ABQ]

We had the Thule from Sears, and used it on top of our Honda Odyssey.  I could reach inside pretty easily by standing in the open side-door.  We mostly used it for stuff that we needed at our destination, but not along the route.  The things we needed all the time were kept inside the van.  

 

Make sure your car racks are big enough to accommodate it.   It fit our Outback, and it fit our minivan, but it wouldn't fit smaller cars.  We tried to give ours to our niece, but the rack on her Civic was too small.

[SABE]

Our minivan has no roof rack, so our options for carriers are limited. We ended up buying a Roof Bag several years ago, and we've never regretted the purchase.  https://www.roofbag.com/  We also purchased the protective mat and optional duffle bags to make loading easier, and those have been worth every penny. We have driven our Roof Bag through several periods of torrential rain (including a tropical storm once) and nothing inside the bag has ever gotten wet.