Roof mounted tent????

Humm, hadn't thought of silver. That's the problem with a black car, nothing goes with it. We'll that and they darn hot in the summer.
 
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I'm getting our RTT in this weekend hopefully, it's going to spend a few months on the Foz but ultimately live on a small trailer. Did any of ya'll mount your's to the factory cross bars? I've got a set of Yakima bars I can borrow from my wife's car but that would mean no bike rack until the trailer is built.
 
I used Thule roof racks on the Foz (Rhino on the Triton). By "factory cross bars" do you mean mount directly onto the roof rails?
 
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These guys, I've got 4 of them fwiw.
 
OK - I see. My concern with those would be that they are not completely flat and would have rub points unless you wrap some sort of covering around them first.
 
So if i will sleep there , my wife and my son...Roof will hold all three of us , no damage to roof ?
 
^^ The roof can take the entire weight of the car, as the rails are mounted flush against it (and are resting above the B and C pillars, which are ridiculously robust.

Weight on the rails is not the issue, the crossbars is what has the load limit. They mount to the rails and are mostly plastic. They are rated for 200 lbs. I would go for a robust mounting method such as aftermarket crossbars made of metal.

My factory cross bars loaded with my basket, two bike rails with bikes attached, and some gear in the basket, you could move the basket, and see the strain on the crossbars. I wouldn't mount a roof tent to the factory crossbars, I'd get aftermarket ones.

Another thing to think about too is that all of your combined weight is not on the roof while driving, which would cause stress upon the mounting system when you took turns, stopped, accelerated. The vehicle is stationary so the weight isn't a problem at that point.....unless you put a bouncy castle up there, then there could be an issue.
 
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A reminder of mine:
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Do you find yourself missing the space on top for storing your crap?

Do they make a room that attaches to that? I have seen some flip out roof top tents that have rooms that hang down so you are not in the wet and stuff when getting in or out. But they are all about as aerodynamic as a brick. I would really love to find one of the more aero ones like yours with an awning/room.
 
^ i have the style of tent your talking about. and to be honest o have never set up the extra room as it takes too long. but yes they aren't aerodynamic at all and performance when cruising is severely effected as well as economy.
but i do not miss the storage space of the roof for all my stuff. because i can fold up the tent with my pillows blankets sheets etc so it means the car is just camping gear, cloths and food
 
Do you find yourself missing the space on top for storing your crap?

My wheel and jerry carriers on the back of the Foz were necessary. Also, on the top in a Thule roof pod was mainly the tent and bedding anyway.

Do they make a room that attaches to that? I have seen some flip out roof top tents that have rooms that hang down so you are not in the wet and stuff when getting in or out. But they are all about as aerodynamic as a brick. I would really love to find one of the more aero ones like yours with an awning/room.

No, not that I know of. I have seen where one guy attached sail track and had tarps.

But now space is not an issue on my extended trips!

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It's probably completely outside the point, but has anyone thought of putting a roof tent on a small trailer? I was looking at doing this to have like a small camper trailer.

ThorsMitersaw : you can always bend up a small wind deflector for the front of the tent/rack, the local engineering place shouldn't charge much to have some place to tin rolled for a deflector.
 
I'm in the middle of building a trailer for mine. Doing a ruggedized version of something like this.
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with bigger wheels/tires and an adjustable height rack for the tent.
 
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Our tent is kind of big. We enjoyed it on the car but once camp is set up you aren't driving anywhere, it'll be nice to drop off the trailer and do some exploring without all the gear weighing the foz down.
 
Forester roof rails are load limited to 80 kg?

The rating is for whilst the vehicle is moving, so it is fine to have more weight when stationary.

I would love to have a roof tent, but the wife isn't keen which is why we went for the oztent.
 
once camp is set up you aren't driving anywhere, it'll be nice to drop off the trailer and do some exploring without all the gear weighing the foz down.

Thats what I've always thought...

I'm in the middle of building a trailer for mine. Doing a ruggedized version .... with bigger wheels/tires and an adjustable height rack for the tent.

You could also do better wheel travel & ground clearance with longer suspension, & an offroad hitch :lildevil:
 
It's probably completely outside the point, but has anyone thought of putting a roof tent on a small trailer? I was looking at doing this to have like a small camper trailer.

If you do this make sure you have some wind down arms to stabilise the trailer - otherwise your weight in the camper can make the trailer tip up and feel very unstable in general!

I know this as we shoved our roof top camper on a trailer then realised we didn't have a jockey wheel on the trailer or stands to hold it up, but we soon sorted that out. Still not ideal - those stabiliser arms are the way to go ;)

Cheers

Bennie
 
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