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weight on L300 roof. 450lbs?

Posted: Thu Aug 28, 2014 10:38 am
by rouxel
I have a 91 L300 super and I was wondering how much weight can i safely carry on my roof including roof rack. Im building a custom rack at my shop. It quite big. Its 10' x 3' going down the left side of the roof and on the right side i have a carrier that is 9' x 1.5" that is water proof and lockable. with roof rack, carrier and both being fully loaded im thinking it could weigh up to 400lbs maybe even as high as 450lbs. Is that to much?

we are going on a 3 week 7000km road trip. there will be a decent amount of mountain driving as well as "mild off road driving" like gravel roads and fields cuz we are gonna stay on crown land where ever we can. its going to me and my gf and 2 large dogs in the van. No seats, just a plat form for sleeping. so how much weight can go on the roof without being dangerous from being overweight or just to top heavy and have the possibility of tipping?

I was thinking about putting 2" wheel spacers on to help with durability as well.

Travis

Re: weight on L300 roof. 450lbs?

Posted: Thu Aug 28, 2014 4:49 pm
by macro
Hopefully Nick can chime in on this, but I believe he had two roof boxes and a smaller rack on his L300 for a North America trip. You could PM him and see (nxski).

As for wheel spacers, I would NOT. Especially for a long trip. You could always do a 2" lift with wider tires though! :-D

Re: weight on L300 roof. 450lbs?

Posted: Thu Aug 28, 2014 10:54 pm
by nxski
macro wrote:As for wheel spacers, I would NOT. Especially for a long trip. You could always do a 2" lift with wider tires though!
Ditto!

I have 1 modern thule box that weighs very little filled with auto parts, a second older thule box that weighs around 80lbs and was filled with camping equipment. On the back I had a roof basket with additional roof racks clamped to it and that held three 25L Jerry cans which were, at one point, all full for a 4x4 trip through Joshua Tree. If it hadn't been for my front racks having very small feet, it wouldn't have been a problem, but the smaller feet did cause the gutters to warp a little bit.

Re: weight on L300 roof. 450lbs?

Posted: Fri Aug 29, 2014 6:04 am
by rouxel
how was the ride? did it make you feel top heavy or "tippy." did you feel more sluggish at all?

Thanks

Travis

Re: weight on L300 roof. 450lbs?

Posted: Sun Aug 31, 2014 6:02 pm
by nxski
The ride was fine, I did 56,000km like that (generally without the jerry cans being full). When they were full it would lean more around corners but still didn't feel too tippy. I've only tipped my van over once and it was because I got t-boned by a Hyundai. :-D