roof bars

Take them off............... Sorry, couldn't help myself :-)

John , after I posted & read the thread ,your reply was what i was thinking, looks like a trailer might be coming sooner than I anticaped ,going from a extra cab to a wagon ,can not fit all camping gear in with passengers.

Take note everyone thinking of adding roof bars to their truck.

Try and find someone who is already using them and ask about the noise level ! I know a couple of people who have removed their bars shortly after fitting them due to the noise.

I know the feeling, I run two bars and a roof coffin for trips on my 120.

Turn the music up, it drowns out road noise, wind noise, passenger and kids.

I have Rhino (squarish U-channel) Commercial bars on my 120 series Prado. Actually I kept the bars themselves from my old 4WD and just got the specialised Rhino "legs" for them. These legs have "feet" that are the bit that attaches to the pre-drilled holes in the Prado roof (in the rain channel, make sure you add some water sealant to the bolt holes when first installing). The setup is designed so that you can remove the bars + legs (still attached to each other) leaving just the feet on the vehicle. There is even a little cap supplied that goes on top of the feet to make it all tidy. To re-attach just remove the cap, put the legs-and-bars back in exactly the same place you removed them from, and bolt on. The removal or re-attachment process take 30 seconds per side. That way you only have the bars on when you need them, thus avoiding any noise factor in between times, and helping to keep fuel consumption dow. Yes, having even just bars on top upsets the air flow over the roof, produces drag, and adds to the fuel consumption (a bit, not much).

Mr Tuck ,

I have a 6' x 4' alloy roof rack which never comes off and I have never noticed any noise from it . It has a perspex wind deflector on the front - maybe that is what makes the difference .

I wonder if it's the uprights or the cross members that are making the noise . Would it be possible to change the shape somehow to stop it ?

That would be as bad as the crap noise from aggressive tyre tread patterns - I could not live with it .

Good luck ,

Willie .

PS the spell check asked me if I would like to replace "perspex" with "perspex". Hmm .

Hi, I have a 3 bar set for my 120 Prado and unless I have my canoe or something that needs all three bars I simply take the cross bar off the front one and leave the mounting blocks in place. This eliminates the noise and still means that I can put on top short stuff.

Cheers
Viv

Thanks Viv I will do the same Friar