I recently purchased a 97 limited with sunroof. Can anyone recommend a roof rack that mounts to the factory rails? Hoping to get this squared away before ski season.

Thanks,

JNR

I have the Thule towers on mine. The Towers are great but the factory rails are less than satisfactory. Now perhaps I load too much stuff up there.


I currently have the factory rails with the thule towers at the back, and at the back door Thule towers that hook onto the door frame. I found using the factory rack alone was noisy and it seemed to really flex the roof. When I have a lot of stuff I ad a third cross bar over the front doors.

The bolts holding the factory rails in seem really flimsy, and I'm not sure what they thread into but it doesn't seem much. I tried tightening the torx screws and stripped whatever was there in one of the holes.

Let me know if anyone has a nice solution to these stripped threads.

I don't know if that helps at all, just my experience.

Tom

sorry to hijack but do they make any snowboard/ fishing rod holders for the oem racks?

I've always used Yakima racks. They're not perfect (some parts rust in my maritime clime) but they are plentiful. Go to Rack Attack to see prices and model numbers. Then go to eBay and get a used set for less than half. The towers are universal, the clips to your rack are special. The towers that don't need the factory rack will be a stronger mount. The poles are the same as a plastic coated 3/4" iron gas pipe. The only thing is that the gas pipe is yellow, not black. Paint it with rattle can plastic paint. I also find the universal towers in thrift stores etc. Then you only need the clips or "landing pads" for your specific vehicle. I live near an outdoorsy college town. You might try a similiar area for used stuff like this.
Have fun, Edy

i am going to take a picture of my rails and post it. they're not really rails with tracks or anything. they just appear to be rails bolted onto the roof with no place to attach anything else. in fact, you will see that there is already some cheapy aftermarket rack installed (to be removed) on the inside of these rails but which is too flimsy to serve any practical purpose. i went somewhere that sells thule and yakima and they couldn't figure out how to mount any towers to these factory rails. so i'll post the photo and please forgive our ignorance in advance if there is something obvious we are looking over.

Yakima claims to have a rack for virtually every situation. Go to their website, get their phone number and talk to a rep. That will answer your question as to whether you can get a rack to fit your factory rails. If they don't have it, I really doubt you will find it. You may be stuck with towers that clip to your roof at the door opening and forgetting about the factory rails.

You're not talking about the black caps that came on the vehicle if you didn't get the factory kit are you.

I had some black strips on my roof. about 5 bolts in each, these were just place holders, I then went out and bought the factory tracks that bolt in.. in hine sight I should have saved my money and stuck with the towers that go in the door frames.. I'm only using one set of towers in the tracks now because they just didn't seem to hold the load well.

And yes Thule makes Snow board holders for all their racks same as Yakama.. all good quality stuff. althought I did have a failure on my yakama bike rack... but I think it is cause my mountain bike is too heavy

having done some research at the local mall parking lot, you are correct. those were just the caps. didn't realize the roof was predrilled for the rack at the factory. i'm going ahead and installing a factory rack. i only do skis and from what i've seen the factory rack seems sturdy enough to handle skis only.

my question is, as i mentioned there is a super-flimsy rack previous owner installed that i want to remove (i could pull it off with my bare hands). what is a good way to plug the holes that were drilled for that rack to protect from corrosion?

They drilled into the body of the vehicle?

I'm no body guy but I would say remove the screws, fill an paint? or maybe look around for some rubber plugs, fill put some grease on the exposed metal,and insert rubber plugs?

good luck.

BTW I've seen some of the factory racks on this site, as well as on e-bay.

Let me know if you have anyproblems, I can Probably find the old part numbers.

One last thing you may want to consider.. if you don't need to leave the racks on all the time. you may consider yakama or Thule racks that clamp in the 4 doors (probably cheaper in the long run) Yakama also sells tracks and towers, you may be able to just buy those and mount them in the holes you have on the roof where the factory rack would go.

Tom

Tom