Hi all,
I am thinking of buying the cross bars. Being a snowboarder, that would allow me to put my board on the roof. But I also would like to keep the ceiling clean in summers, so here comes a few questions:
1) Is it easy to take the cross bars off in summer?
2) I saw that it comes w/ locks. What are those for? Would that help for my purpose?
3) Any one has a picture of the cross bars installed, and when they are unlocked?
Thank you all in advance, and wish you a happy holiday season!
Do you have cross bars?
I've got the crossbars, bought them off of an ebay reseller for much cheaper than the dealership. I'll take some pictures tomorrow with them on and some close ups of the attachment points. I had them on last winter with an old pair of Thule flat top 4s and took them off for the summer.
A couple things to note, the bars are manufactured by an Australian company called whispbar. A cross section of the bars would be tear drop shaped to reduce noise. I think I remember the ebay reseller price was cheaper still than the manufacturer, but you should be able to get a better idea of what the bars look like knowing who makes them.
Installation requires that you attach a bracket to each roof anchor (2 screws each, 8 total) Each bracket has a single bolt sticking up. The crossbars go on top of the bolts, and tighten down with flat red wing nuts.
The locks you see are for an outer faceplate that prevents access to the wing nuts. The faceplates are the only place you'll see the Suzuki branding.
One thing I highly regretted when trying to put them back on this winter was that I didn't treat the permanent threads on the roof, nor the screws for the brackets last year. Rust!!
It took a little bit of elbow grease and a ton of wd40 to get them tightened back down, glad I put them on when it was above 50 degrees outside. Hopefully, come spring, they won't be permanently attached. I haven't come up with a good idea regarding rustproofing them next spring when/if I take them back off again.
Overall quality of the bars are very impressive, they're width adjustable with tensioners, and very stable when installed, definitely don't feel cheap. The Thule ski racks are my only real complaint but hey I stole them from my parents who don't ski anymore. Concerns there are the brackets that go around the crossbar don't fit quite right due to the teardrop bar shape, and they're the old model that stand very tall and cause a lot of noise.
P.S. Looks like whispbar was either a child company or was bought out by Yakima:
http://www.yakima.com/shop/racksystems/ ... ar-s1-flsh
A couple things to note, the bars are manufactured by an Australian company called whispbar. A cross section of the bars would be tear drop shaped to reduce noise. I think I remember the ebay reseller price was cheaper still than the manufacturer, but you should be able to get a better idea of what the bars look like knowing who makes them.
Installation requires that you attach a bracket to each roof anchor (2 screws each, 8 total) Each bracket has a single bolt sticking up. The crossbars go on top of the bolts, and tighten down with flat red wing nuts.
The locks you see are for an outer faceplate that prevents access to the wing nuts. The faceplates are the only place you'll see the Suzuki branding.
One thing I highly regretted when trying to put them back on this winter was that I didn't treat the permanent threads on the roof, nor the screws for the brackets last year. Rust!!
It took a little bit of elbow grease and a ton of wd40 to get them tightened back down, glad I put them on when it was above 50 degrees outside. Hopefully, come spring, they won't be permanently attached. I haven't come up with a good idea regarding rustproofing them next spring when/if I take them back off again.Overall quality of the bars are very impressive, they're width adjustable with tensioners, and very stable when installed, definitely don't feel cheap. The Thule ski racks are my only real complaint but hey I stole them from my parents who don't ski anymore. Concerns there are the brackets that go around the crossbar don't fit quite right due to the teardrop bar shape, and they're the old model that stand very tall and cause a lot of noise.
P.S. Looks like whispbar was either a child company or was bought out by Yakima:
http://www.yakima.com/shop/racksystems/ ... ar-s1-flsh
Pictures:
Bracket attached to the factory anchors:
With Crossbar attached + wingnut tightened:
Cover with lock to prevent theft:
Bracket attached to the factory anchors:
Had to dig through my email archives the reseller was mitsu-jeff
Latest listing for it:
http://www.ebay.com/itm/Suzuki-Kizashi- ... 43a678d3b4
and $15 cheaper here:
http://www.ebay.com/itm/Suzuki-Kizashi- ... 20b94be210
Latest listing for it:
http://www.ebay.com/itm/Suzuki-Kizashi- ... 43a678d3b4
and $15 cheaper here:
http://www.ebay.com/itm/Suzuki-Kizashi- ... 20b94be210
chest3r, Yo'da man!!chest3r wrote:Had to dig through my email archives the reseller was mitsu-jeff
Latest listing for it:
http://www.ebay.com/itm/Suzuki-Kizashi- ... 43a678d3b4
and $15 cheaper here:
http://www.ebay.com/itm/Suzuki-Kizashi- ... 20b94be210