i searched and searched but all i found was a lot of people telling others to search!



this is my goal.

i wanna use some good ipf's to do this.

now: how can i mount lights to the stock roof rack? any help or links to help are appreciated. thankee.

 

i'd think you would be better off moving the larger, elevated rails back a little and making a bracket that used 2 of the flush rails. that's the only way i really see it working

 

I think...
You'd either have to fab up a bracket, or drill holes down through one of the cross bars.

 

id figured the latter would be easiest... but i guess im wondering a couple things

1) has anyone done this? would a drilled hole in the stock rail be strong enough to hold the lights on the highway, on the trail, while getting whacked around?

2) id like to make them removeable. i have a tough enough time getting into underground parking in downtown boston as is!

3) where would i run the wires?

 

you could get 2 slices of plate steel, one being an inch longer then the other, and sandwitch the cross bars between the 2 strips, and bolt it together leaving the longer strip on top so you can mount the light to it.

 

And drilling the cross bars might be the cheapest. They are fairly secure, but security might be an issue. How about disconnects?

You could get a pair of q-towers and a load bar. Mount the lights to the bar and you can lock it in place

 

That's why I suggested 2 rails. I don't think using just one would be sufficient @ highway speeds.

lemme see if I can sketch something? I'm on a mac with nothing useful right now though

 

q-towers and a load bar? can you give me a link or more info?

 

yea, thats my concern...

that sounds really plausible... thanks, good idea...

 

What he said. I think you should go for 4 lights on top instead of 3 though...

 

My bad. They are Yakima products. The towers slide into the existing roof rails and support the new load bars. Another advantage to this is you can have a fully functional roof rack as you can get almost any accesory for them--bike rake, canoe, basket, cargo coffin, haul lumber.....

http://yakima.com/home.html

 

just checked it out...

ok. so theyre mounted in the door frame. i get the q tower, so do i need the q clips too?

this sounds like a great plan. i can get all of that for under 150 it seems...

how do i mount the lights directly to the bar then?

 

Yes you will need the clips, they're vehicle specific.

 

there are two mounting options. One goes in the roof rails, the other in the rain gutter under the weather stripping. The latter hold more weight, but they flex on the upper part of the door a little. It bothered me so I went with the towers that slide into the factory rails--perhaps not called q-towers. Either way gets the same effect, just different mounting and placement options.

FWIW I have an extra pair of 48" bars for sale

 

1.) I would think that the lights would vibrate/shake at higher speeds, say... anything over 20mph or so... I just don't think the stock bars are rigid enough.

2.) I don't know about IPFs... but my Hellas just have a bolt post that goes through the mounting plate/bar. A nut tightens things down and holds the lamp in place. Use a couple of quick connect male/female electical wire connectors and they are fairly simple to remove.

3.) few of ways of doing it... you could run them up the pillar between the front seats and teh rear seats (where the front seatbelts are), then out the top of the door. This would screw with your weather striping and could cause leaks... not sure. You could run them up under the headliner, then out through the yellow plugs that hide under the stock roof rack rail end caps.

 

i dont know if this helps for a 3rd gen but heres how i wired my KCs http://www1.pacific.edu/~c-eaklan/4r...htwrite-up.htm

 

chris, i keep thinking you ARE jim and ignoring you thanks.

jackson, eric, todd, jay.. thanks as well... great info guys, you didnt let me down.

im gonna look into this and post info as i get it.

 

new question:

ive read about those remote controls they have to turn on fog lights... i think it was in a perf. products catalog. it saves you the trouble of running wires and allows you to mount a button on your dash to turn them on and off.

anyone know if this will work for my application?

 

I'm pretty certain that a couple of Universal mightymounts by yakima might do the trick for you. I'll check out tonight when I'm at work and get back to you on it. Did you have a specific IPF that you where interested in mounting to your Factory Rack?

 

how about using Vertical or horizontal MightyMounts from Yakima onto the factory cross bars? If the can hold my kayak they can hold you lights