Front Runner Roof Rack Failure

[mudgrubber]

I do not understand the need to fit a RTT on top of a roof rack. A roof rack is too expensive a piece of real estate to waste it by mounting a roof rack on it.

A RTT needs to be fitted to two roof bars at most. My two roof bars are 25mm mild steel sq tubing with a 3mm wall, which I had colour passivated (tin plated). That saves a lot of unnecessary weight that is not serving any purpose on the roof. All you need is a short roof rack in front of the RTT. My shorter roof rack is also African Outback made. It is roughly 1.1m long and 1.35m wide.

I have run it like that on 5 of my 4x4s I've had, this is since about 2001 .

Having said that, I have had one failure. Three of the African Outback feet (2mm mild steel) cracked. About two years ago I started hearing a "clack, clack" sound, and realised it was coming from the rack. I slowed down, wound the driver's window down and held on to the rack. The noise stopped. I stopped and saw the one foot had cracked, an inspection of the rest found that three feet had cracked.

I was about 10km from Vaalwater, so I stopped at a tyre outlet/exhaust fitment centre in Vaalwater and asked them to reweld the cracks and weld steel gussets to both sides of each of the four feet. These were gutter mount feet and I have not had a problem since.

You live and learn. With a fold up RTT it is "nice" to have RR space for firewood and rubbish. With a full length clamshell type roof bars are better (IMHO) BUT you need three for the AluCab tent; it is just not strong enough to span between two; regardless of what AluCab say; I have the t shirt. By the way I think the AluCab mounting system with L brackets is over complicated and crude but that is just me.

Just recently I saw the same gutter mount feet on another vehicle. Out of curiosity, I inspected the feet and noticed that the section where mine had cracked, had been redesigned and the gusset was indeed about 50% wider. Obviously mine was not the only feet that had cracked, and they remedied the under designed feet.

You live and learn, fold up RTT it is nice to have roof rack space for firewood and rubbish etc. Full length AluCab type, three loadbars are better to limit sag, regardless of what AluCab say, got the t shirt in Mabua. IMHO the L shaped AluCab mounting system is over complicated and crude.

[Darth]

More fong kong steel. Too much boron and other additives added.

I’ve been rambling on the forum now for some time about the low quality steel coming out of China.

I’ve lost count how many bolts I turned heads off with minimal force due to substandard raw materials.

[Slief]

Yes guys, I also had roof rack brackets fail, on the last day coming through Kaokoland from Skeleton coast. So there was a lot of rough riding as the rains in Koakoland recently washed away a lot of roads plus the dreaded corrugations. So there must have been a lot of flex in the Prado body. There were 2 load bars installed on Stainless steel brackets purchased online from a well known source (no bad reflection on them). The company that installed them assured me the brackets were strong and they did not know of problems or comebacks. Alas, two of the brackets broke exactly in the bend of the inner bracket. And the 3rd while working on it by the mechanics at Palmwag. They fixed it with standard iron angle and gave great service and no invoice!! On inspection it showed that the 2 mm stainless steel brackets tore like paper exactly on the 90° bend, which probably already tore while bending to sharply.
Back home I added another load bar and then purchased load bar brackets from Quick Pitch. They are 3 mm thick and a nice round 90°bend. Be sure to align the brackets for height, as there is always flex in the body, and yes typically one is overloaded with the RTT's and "stuff" on top.
And thank you to all my touring friends for the multiple ratchet straps that got me to Palmwag

[niclemaitre]

When getting parts laser cut and bent, you have to specify a bend radius for the bending die that they use. That bend radius is normally the same as the thickness of the metal the part is cut from. Increasing the bend radius in the same thickness metal will not really produce a stronger part. It will still flex and fatigue in the bend, then snap.

The only way to avoid this is to strengthen the part so that any flex doesn't fatigue the part, either by adding support as gussets or using a thicker metal part.

If you like, I can make a drawing of your bracket in thicker steel for laser cutting and bending

[TRON]

My previous RR was a AO/BC one and it never let me down even with occasional overloading. With the Icarus conversion there was a increase in vehicle height which meant that with the RR installed it was too high to fit into my garage. After shopping around I decided to replace it with a FR RR. This, together with tyre replacement, resulted in a vehicle height reduction and now it does fit into my garage.

There is a marked difference/reduction in the sturdiness of FR rack and it definitely cannot/will not have the same loading capability.

[pjf110]

I very recently bought a pair of the older style roof rack feet from FR to lift the rack slightly higher to accommodate under rack table.

I was pleasantly surprised to see the bottom L bracket has probably been doubled in thickness. When I checked the existing found they had bent slightly, not great considering my SWB roofrack has never been overloaded.

FR definitely has a core focus on light weight but it appears this comes at a cost, I will give them credit for improving products as issues arise.

As a side note Roofrack’s are prone to abuse/overloading by novices. Not all failures can be attributed to bad manufacturing.

Just changed my rear FR bracket, the newer one is substantially thicker. I think FR should offer to sell these separately. See pics:

[niclemaitre]

Just changed my rear FR bracket, the newer one is substantially thicker. I think FR should offer to sell these separately. See pics:

Interesting. That looks like a sintered part, not a laser cut and bent piece of sheet like previously.

[BushNomad]

2 out of four of their
2mm mounting brackets failed for me …

… i just bent/fashioned some galvanized
alloy strips of ~ 5mm thickness
and they have fared far better …. !

[Rebel 4x4]

2 out of four of their
2mm mounting brackets failed for me …

… i just bent/fashioned some galvanized
alloy strips of ~ 5mm thickness
and they have faired far better …. !

I hope the clients actually send this to FR. In most cases, the clients are to blame when the manufacturers don’t fix the problems….. why? Because the manufacturers won’t know of issues if they are not informed of the issues.

My feeling is that this is possibly the reason.

[BushNomad]

I hope the clients actually send this to FR. In most cases, the clients are to blame when the manufacturers don’t fix the problems….. why? Because the manufacturers won’t know of issues if they are not informed of the issues.

My feeling is that this is possibly the reason.

I dont own a Bush Lapa
( … yet , as I still RTT, OzTent etc ! ),
… but I believe they ‘look and learn’ and automatically monitor their clients
comments, adaptations satisfaction etc

I get the feeling they just routinely watch their market space like hawks …
and continually evolve and improve their products to cater to demand etc ;

… perchance Front Runner can start to learn from them ?

[pjf110]

2 out of four of their
2mm mounting brackets failed for me …

… i just bent/fashioned some galvanized
alloy strips of ~ 5mm thickness
and they have fared far better …. !

Very concerning as I have the same mounts

[jfh]

2 out of four of their
2mm mounting brackets failed for me …

… i just bent/fashioned some galvanized
alloy strips of ~ 5mm thickness
and they have fared far better …. !

A simple de-burr in the bend radius would have solved the problem.
Attention to detail by the manufacturer and I see the same on very expensive aircraft.

[RooRoo]

2 out of four of their
2mm mounting brackets failed for me …

… i just bent/fashioned some galvanized
alloy strips of ~ 5mm thickness
and they have fared far better …. !

Reach out to Front Runner.
They have redesigned their tent mount kits.

Their after sales is generally very good.

[Paul#25]

2 out of four of their
2mm mounting brackets failed for me …

… i just bent/fashioned some galvanized
alloy strips of ~ 5mm thickness
and they have fared far better …. !

Looking at the photo of the brackets as my reference as I've not actually seen them.
The first thing that I see is that the bend radius is very sharp. The plates are probably bent on a bending brake that has a sharp edge. If the radius of the bend is increased slightly, it will make the bend much stronger.
If the outer ends of the brackets are repeatedly moved, even very slightly, the stress raises in the bend, and it will fail.
To alleviate this type of failure, a thicker material bent with a bigger radius can be used.

[Darth]

Interesting. That looks like a sintered part, not a laser cut and bent piece of sheet like previously.

Looking at the elevated edges around part and rougher finish, likely metal injection molding.

[AndreZA]

Tell me again the maximum weight on a roofrack.........