I'm buying a sea kayak soon, and therefore will need a rack mounted atop my westy pop top. For those with experience in these matters, how much worse is the handling from being blown around by the wind with a 16-foot kayak sailing along attached to your roof? It's windy around here and oftentimes I've nearly sailed out of my lane without anything strapped to the roof. And...anyone know of an option to the Yakima/Thule racks and typical setups? Once I saw a rack bolted to the rain gutter within an inch of the rear of the van, and another at the rear of the luggage rack, allowing for a low rack height and the pop top to open when the rack is attached (but not with gear like a kayak tied on obviously). The van was a Westy here on vacation from Germany, and I've never seen anything like the rack here. It seemed to be constructed of square aluminum, unpainted. I'll attempt to create a drawing of it here: __ /|| < Roof rack "tower" and "cross-rod" to hold gear. //|| _________//_||__ < Top of pop-top roof // || | _______//___||__| ________________|< Raingutter | VAN REAR | | |
Steve -- Steve Sullivan Mount Vernon, Washington Calvin, the 84 Westy Hobbes, the imaginary Westy Syncro |
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