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Only certain vehicles can carry a roof tent; you may find that suppliers of other roof tent brands take a more relaxed view, but Yakima is primarily a major designer and manufacturer of vehicle roof bar and other load carrying systems, so they know the engineering and the risks, and they wouldn’t put barriers in the way of sales unless there are very good reasons for doing so.
The vehicle and roof bars need to be strong enough, and the same for the roof bar fixings.
Key considerations:
- The vehicle roof and the roof bars must have a minimum dynamic load limit of 75kg. The dynamic load is the load on a moving vehicle; you’ll find this information in your vehicle handbook and in the roof bar instructions, described as e.g. "Maximum load"
- The lower of these limits is your load carrying limit. Note that some dealer supplied roof bars may have lower limits than the roof bars we supply
- The dynamic load on the vehicle roof will include the weight of the roof tent (Medium = 54kg, Small = 46kg) and the weight of the roof bars
- You must not fit Yakima roof tents to plain roof / clamp on roof bar systems. The risk of roof damage is too high, and flexing roof bars might also loosen the fitting kit clamps, especially if the roof bars are not correctly fitted. So you can only fit Yakima roof tents to roof bars which fit to raised roof rails (see below), flush mounted roof rails, fixpoints, T-tracks, or gutters
- Raised roof rails. Some raised roof rails are too weak; they are OK if there are more than two legs, or a two leg system is supported at each end. Additionally, the cross bars must be positioned as close as possible to the side or centre rail legs. See
for more information
Other checks and notes:
- The distance between the front roof bar and the rear roof bar, centre to centre, must be between 66cm and 102cm when fitting a SkyRise HD which unfolds on the side of the car, and between 66cm and 87.5cm when fitting a SkyRise HD so it unfolds over the rear of the car
- Remember that a fully loaded vehicle roof raises the centre of gravity, which will affect road handling
- If you are driving off road, the dynamic load should, as a rule of thumb, be reduced by 30%. Dynamic loads that are published in vehicle handbooks and roof bar instructions assume that the vehicle is being driven on generally smooth and even tarmac. And by “off road” we have in mind proper off road driving on any continent, e.g. the Australian Outback. The UK doesn’t have territory of this sort; we’re not thinking about e.g. a few miles of rough track to a remote campsite.
The static load that is permitted on a vehicle roof, when the vehicle is stationary, is not usually mentioned in the vehicle handbook; it may be presumed to be three (3) times the dynamic load.
For example, if the vehicle load limit is 75kg, and the roof bars can hold 100kg, the dynamic loading limit is 75kg. 3 x 75kg is 225kg, less 54kg for the tent and 7kg for the roof bars leaves 164kg for the roof tent occupants. If one occupant weighs 90kg, that only leaves 74kg for the others. Common sense should be applied here – 3 people at 90kg is likely to be too heavy a weight; 1 at 90kg and 1 at 85kg is unlikely to be a problem, bearing in mind that a static load of three times the dynamic load is only a rule of thumb.
Importantly, it is up to you to decide whether to carry a roof tent, and what weight to put in it. If in doubt, research the subject in more depth, or ask your car dealer for an opinion. Neither we nor Yakima will be liable for damage, to vehicles and / or users and / or third parties, associated with the fitting and loading of Yakima roof tents.
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