Baja MegaMule Low Garage and Skis

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mccurdy21

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Backstory,

The lady and I purchased a 2016 LR4 in August, it came with a few dealer installed options including blacked out wheels, tail lights and the Baja roof rack/ladder. These options really set of the fuji white and was one of the main, eye appealing, "Buy Me" factors that the LR4 had... not to take away from all of the other reasons, but looks to matter. We really didn't intend to buy when we were cruising the lot that day but when she saw this **** beast, it was all over.

The conundrum...

We got the "Stormtrooper" home and quickly found that at normal ride height we had about 1" clearance between the baja rack and the top of the garage door. I immediately panicked knowing that we spend every weekend up in the mountains skiing/boarding in the winter and there was no way we were throwing the hardware in the back of the rig.... How was I to get a ski rack up there without bashing it into the garage every week when we got home.

I searched and searched for clamp on options from Baja, Landrover, google, thule, yakima etc... looked at a couple homebrew systems that other people had come up with and just couldn't find what I was looking for. The lady was insistent on keeping the roof rack on solely based on the badassery of how it set off the stormtrooper from other white LR4s in the area, so removing the baja rack in lieu of standard rails/cross bars was not an option.

Baja did offer their solution but I didn't like the price or the look of their mounting bracket/crossbars.

upload_2016-12-27_10-31-59.png





The Solution....
So, I knew I needed ski racks that would allow us to fold them down when not in used, I also knew that any cross bars that I added needed to be flush with the top of the rack as it sat. After searching and searching, I found these.

http://www.etrailer.com/Accessories...tml?feed=npn&gclid=COLx5LLulNECFZ2CswodyAkCrA


Now, these are for the yakima branded basket which is only 36" wide. The MegaMule is 48" wide. I ordered these and then picked up some 48" yakima round bars. Cut about 1/8" off of each bar with the sawsall, drilled some holes and mounted them up.


upload_2016-12-27_10-15-51.png


upload_2016-12-27_10-16-20.png



And, a video:


In the end, I spent 3 months hemming and hawing over what to do. Just hoping to help out the next DIYer who refuses to settle for just what the market provides and is ready to think outside the box a bit.

Forum won't let me post more pics, so I will add a few more in the next post.

~Aaron
 

backcountryLR4

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Thanks for posting. This is pretty brilliant.
I just got a "stormtrooper" too. I don't have a lot of clearance in my garage and I ski a few times a week and have been worried about what to do rack wise.

How's the wind noise on that setup? Out in the west here I'm normally doing 85 on the freeway and have that as a concern.
 

mccurdy21

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Thanks for posting. This is pretty brilliant.
I just got a "stormtrooper" too. I don't have a lot of clearance in my garage and I ski a few times a week and have been worried about what to do rack wise.

How's the wind noise on that setup? Out in the west here I'm normally doing 85 on the freeway and have that as a concern.


The wind doesn't seem to be any worse than it was before. I would like to think that the wind fairing on the mule is helping with that.
 

Jim D

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Just came across your post after scratching my head over the exact same dilemma. Not sure why Baja or Voyager doesn't take into consideration that some people like to ski and snowboard. Brilliant solution, I even have a spare set of Yakima cross bars laying around. Now all I need to do is order the Baja Rack (how do you like it BTW?) Thanks for the detailed post.
 

mccurdy21

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Just came across your post after scratching my head over the exact same dilemma. Not sure why Baja or Voyager doesn't take into consideration that some people like to ski and snowboard. Brilliant solution, I even have a spare set of Yakima cross bars laying around. Now all I need to do is order the Baja Rack (how do you like it BTW?) Thanks for the detailed post.


Season #2 with the same setup, don't think I could have gone any other way and everything still functioning well... Now to figure out how to get a Denver Outfitters Rod Vault on there. However, we have a home remodel coming sometime in the next couple years, raising up the garage doors is one of my "must haves".

The baja rack is great, functional in so many ways and also give a nice look that really sets the LR4 off from everyone else's. There is a slight increase in wind noise and I'm sure a slight mpg reduction. I feel like the wind noise issue may be something wrong with the sunroof sealing or draining system, just haven't had the time to troubleshoot it.
 

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