anyone made functional limb-risers?
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Winching
Joined: Oct 2012
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anyone made functional limb-risers?
I'm interested in this idea but I started thinking about it and to make it work I think you need a really beefy, steel bar fairly high and wide over the windscreen or it won't work. Most of the roof racks, including mine have strong enough gutter mount brackets but they are just barely above the top corners of the windscreen. Securing the risers there is only going to protect the bottom half of the windscreen. The top of the risers really need to be secured so that the cable passes about 9 inches above the top corner of the glass. There's two problems with that. First, my roofrack is narrower at that height, so the cables will cross into the path of the hood when it opens. Second, the roof rack is chintzy at that height. I mean, the material is not strong enough to mount anything that will hold back wrist-thick limbs. For the littler stuff, I'll just push it with the glass. I guess I'm giving up on the idea because my roof rack just isn't up to it.
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Winching
Joined: Oct 2012
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Well, I think the problem I see is that a suitable roof rack is quite a beast. The CT racks were very tall, heavy steel, and bolted to the roll cage. They were also very wide (wider than the vehicle at the roofline) and very long (they went from the rear door all the way to the top of the windscreen).
I looked at putting limb-risers on a lower-profile roof rack and/or one that sits farther back on the roof and determined that they won't work.
So deciding to weld up a functional rack for the purpose would necessarily entail a decision to mount a giant, towering, heavy steel rack. In CT, choices like that were pre-determined. For me, there's more sensible options.
I looked at putting limb-risers on a lower-profile roof rack and/or one that sits farther back on the roof and determined that they won't work.
So deciding to weld up a functional rack for the purpose would necessarily entail a decision to mount a giant, towering, heavy steel rack. In CT, choices like that were pre-determined. For me, there's more sensible options.
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Winching
Joined: Oct 2012
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What's wrong with my rack? It's not beefy enough. I saw the thread with Hilltoppersx's limb risers. I read he ripped the top eye-bolts off more than once. I'm not wanting to add insult to injury. If anything he helped me avoid the same mistake. My rack is aluminum and I simply don't trust it where it's tall enough. Where it is fairly strong is the steel gutter brackets but those are down lower and farther back so the cables would pass just over the top corners of the windscreen. I've seen several jobs done like that and I don't believe they would actually function. The limb will hit the windscreen and the cables there will do nothing because they're too close to the windscreen.
My conclusion is that to make it work the roof rack needs to tower over the top edge of the windscreen and hold the cables well over and in front of the top corners of the glass. Therefore, my rack isn't suitable.
My conclusion is that to make it work the roof rack needs to tower over the top edge of the windscreen and hold the cables well over and in front of the top corners of the glass. Therefore, my rack isn't suitable.
if i were to do mine over i would have used a clamp rather then that little eye bolt, and i would have put springs in as Tom had suggested in my thread to take some of the shock from heavy branches. overall i was very happy with them and combined with the sand ladders on the side of the rack they cleared a lot of tight trails for people following me.