How To Tie Things To Your Roof Rack

Ideally you ll have some kind of roof racks to tie things onto.

How to tie things to your roof rack.

Roof racks have been known to fail at high speeds with lots of updraft so take the extra precaution of tying the roof rack down to the roof of the vehicle as well. If you have side rails and crossbars the straps can be looped around those. These are great for a lot of reasons but mostly because they give you something solid to anchor to so that your roof mounted load. It s important to use the right tie downs and place the item correctly on the roof rack if you want to avoid damaging your cargo or causing an accident.

Choose your carrier to carry your canoe on a roof rack you ll need a carrier designed for this use. To secure items to the roof rack tie down the equipment with four points of contact. In the case of a naked roof you should be looping the rope through the car through the doors not the windows and around the object on the roof and a towel or blanket should be used to protect the roof of your car from the object. Check your vehicle s manual for how much you can safely carry on your roof rack.

Your owner s manual should say how much your vehicle s roof can support. By using proper methods you can haul your cargo safely to your destination. To safely tie an item to your car s roof start with all the windows down except the driver s window. This will give you the most stability.

Use ratchet or cam straps to tie the roof rack through the doors not the windows. Wrap the straps around the equipment a few times on all four areas to ensure the equipment is properly secure to the. And be mindful of your sunroof anything too firm or heavy could break the glass. Improper tie down practices are all too common and many accidents and injuries happen because someone didn t take their time loading cargo on the roof of the car.

Avoid strapping more than 180 pounds 82 kg to your roof rack. Make sure it doesn t exceed the weight capacity or you could damage your roof or roof rack. Most include the necessary tie downs as well. Remove your rack when not in use to avoid the added weight drag and noise.

There are multiple styles of carriers available.