Roof top tent on an XJ roof rack?

jscherb

Expedition Leader
I've got a roof top tent that I want to mount on an XJ Cherokee roof rack and I'm trying to decide the best way to adapt the tent to the rack.

RTTFr1.jpg


I know some people mount tents to the drip rails of the XJ, but this XJ roof rack isn't actually on an XJ, it's on the fiberglass Safari Cab on my LJ:

STTKwSafari6.jpg


The XJ rack on the Safari Cab is tied in to the LJ's roll bar, so there's no worry about weight capacity on the roof - all of the weight on the rack gets transferred directly to the roll bar, with no weight being borne by the fiberglass.

The Safari Cab does have drip rails, but they're non-structural - meaning, they are not designed to support drip-rail mounted rack bars, so I can't use that solution.

The instructions that come with the tent aren't very specific, they only mention "After-Market Roof Rack Bars":

Instructions2.jpg


The cross-bars on the XJ rack are rated for much less weight than an RTT plus two people, according to the XJ Owner's Manual. I don't know if that's because the XJ's sheet metal roof won't support the weight, or because Jeep is worried about rollover liability, or because the crossbars will simply break under that much weight.

I've done a design for custom brackets to mount in the XJ rack channels that will support the weight, but before I build anything custom, I'm looking to find out what aftermarket XJ rack accessories some of you might have used to mount an RTT on an XJ rack. Thanks in advance for your input.
 

Steve F

Adventurer
The cross bars from the XJ wont support the weight, they are quite flexible and will end and touch the roof and I'd imagine the tent will bound up and down when offroad, although you probably know this. From what I remember there are a few compaines that make a system that mounts to the XJ rails that will take more weight. My RTT just mounts on a rack I made that mounts in the gutters, but then that's the easy way on a XJ ;)

Cheers
Steve
 

Hill Bill E.

Oath Keeper
Besides the bending/drooping of the stock cross bars when sleeping in the tent, the RTT catches a LOT of wind.

The stock bars are not only flexible (which would give some bad bounce in the wind) they aren't that strong where they attach to the 'tower'

You may be good using the rails (track on the roof) and some better cross bars. Someone (I think Thule?) made towers to fit XJ tracks at one time, and they were really beefy.
 

jscherb

Expedition Leader
you could try buying the J100 jeep rack clamp from Surco http://www.surcoinc.com/ and the crossbars in the length you need. below is a link to the picture of each,

http://www.surcoinc.com/images/products/A-J100-JA-PARTS.jpg

http://www.surcoinc.com/images/products/R-S43-SC.jpg

I'm building own roof rack for my XJ and these are what I'm using to support the rack....

Thanks, those Surco brackets are similar to what I've designed, I'll check out the pricing on them and see if the price makes it better to buy vs. build ;).
 

DesertXJ

Observer
Thanks, those Surco brackets are similar to what I've designed, I'll check out the pricing on them and see if the price makes it better to buy vs. build ;).

I found that summitracing has the best price on both, I bought them separately I know i got the crossbars from summit racing, there were a couple of places that were cheaper but now a days it hard to know if you're dealing with a reputable online dealer so for me it was knowing that I was dealing with someone I knew would be there

here is the best price for the J100s at amazon I'm a prime member so my shipping is free.
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B000OAXM2E/sr=8-1/qid=1329062880/ref=olp_product_details?ie=UTF8&me=&qid=1329062880&sr=8-1&seller=

the crossbars did come from Summitracing I combined them with some new leaf spring u bolts for my jeep and had a $20 off coupon.

good luck with your endeavor
 

bob91yj

Resident **************
The XJ rack on the Safari Cab is tied in to the LJ's roll bar, so there's no worry about weight capacity on the roof - all of the weight on the rack gets transferred directly to the roll bar, with no weight being borne by the fiberglass.




.

What keeps the roof from cracking when the body/roll bar deflects over rough terrain if it is has solid attachments?
 

jscherb

Expedition Leader
What keeps the roof from cracking when the body/roll bar deflects over rough terrain if it is has solid attachments?
The hardtop is more flexible than the body/roll bar, so it easily accommodates whatever the body is doing.

It's been well tested on the trails at Moab.

TheWall1.jpg
 

jscherb

Expedition Leader
I ended up buying the Surco XJ rack channel adapters, and with a very minor tweak they work with the bars that came with my RTT.

SurcoAdapters.jpg


Thanks everyone for the input.
 

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