Has anyone ever looked in to if it is possible to remove the factory rails on the KJ and then getting some bars that could be mounted in the track where the rails were? Not sure if this is possible or not, any thoughts?

A few people here have but all custom racks from what I can see. After looking at it myself based on what we have over here, its the same deal - you need to fab a custom mount to match to the stock fixings then either match that to a aftermarket cross rail or weld directly to a cage.

My thoughts when my welding skills get better than bird snot are to weld some mounts directly to the rola vortex rack. why? cos then I can get into a least one carpark in Brisbane and drive to my local shops. plus it would just look better.

_________________
2006 Midnight Blue Jeep Commander 4x4
Bone stock for now.
http://www.pnwjeep.net/forum

Midnight

I have looked on the Rock Lizard website before and have e-mailed them twice to find out the cost to ship to Aus without any reply. I also asked what the load rating of the replacement bars/racks as it isn't stated.

Cheers

Will

Here is a link to some info from the Rock Lizard vendor member guy on LOST.


http://www.lostjeeps.com/forum/phpBB3/viewtopic.php?t=22282

_________________
2006 Midnight Blue Jeep Commander 4x4
Bone stock for now.
http://www.pnwjeep.net/forum

Will,

Sorry I haven't responded to your email. I've never shipped anything that big to Australia, so I have been researching shipping options. As far as load rating, not official, but several local guys are using the HD rails, sport racks, and basket racks. One guy with the HD rails has a Defender Basket rack on it. He had to go to California from Colorado and back, which I believe was about 15-20hrs one way. He had that basket rack loaded down with luggage, big cooler full of ice and beverages, camping equipment, and some other stuff. Rack was full. We figured atleast 250lbs+ gear, and the HD rails didn't budge. The basket rack, Troy has. Before he got his tire carrier installed, he put his spare up there. The spare is a very heavy tire/steel wheel combo weighing around 90lbs. He put the spare on the basket, then sat on top of it (he weighs 200lbs) to strap it down. Since his rack was the very first of the basket racks, it sits only 3/8" from the roof at the closest point, and the basket didn't budge, so 300lbs easy, but I would safely guess 450lbs evenly distributed of course. Now the six square 1" bars on the basket rack are only 14ga (about 3/32" thick), with the main bars being 1.5" OD .120 wall (about 1/8" thick walls) and the front and rear cross bars are 1.25"OD .120 wall. The sport racks have 1.5" OD .120wall main rails with (5) 1.25"OD .120 wall cross bars. It's pretty heavy duty and the "floor" of the sport rack is made of thicker wall tubing, so I would say the sport rack can easily go around 450lbs as well. The HD rails and both racks are pretty stout and can handle a lot, but just like the stock rails, the weak link will be where they mount. The roof of the KJ is pretty thin with just two small bolts per mount. If anything is going to go, it will be the sheetmetal. The nice thing about the racks is all the mounts are essentially tied together, so you would have to really twist the body of the KJ before the mounts come loose, so the sport rack and basket rack will be a much stronger setup over just the HD rails. The HD rails are much stronger than the stock rails just because you replace cheap/weak plastic mounts for steel.

Hope that helps a little. Please be patient with me while I research this shipping thing, because I am trying to find the best at the best price possible, because Australia is a long way.

Rock Lizard

Thanks for the info, let me know when you get an idea for shipping to Australia.

Cheers

Will