Mounting a Roof Basket

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kebm

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I have a Yakima megawarrior basket with 18" extension for our Yukon. I had it mounted to the factory cross bars using the Yakima clamps, but the cross bars flexed too much with bikes mounted to the rack. I replaced the oem crosss bars with unistrut channel from Lowe's. I use unistrut u-bolts to attach the channel to the factory rails, and u-bolts with nylock nuts to fasten the megawarrior to the unistrut.
Sorry, I cannot get any pics, the rack is not on the Yukon right now. I have to remove the rack to store the truck in my garage for winter. The unistrut works well for me. I placed 2 or 3 unistrut washers in the u-bolts between the factory rails and the unistrut cross bars for clearance due to the arch of the roof. The unistrut channel is zinc coated, I scuffed and painted mine with black truck bed coating. Just google unistrut roof rack for ideas, lots of other people using it.
 

owl_93

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I am really hoping I can get some help with this question. I have recently become the proud owner of a 2005 Z-71 suburban and since I own this vehicle outright I will be getting rid of my 2012 FJ Cruiser (mostly because there is no way I am going to lug around kids in a 2 door vehicle).

My FJ had a sweet low profile Baja Rack http://www.bajarack.com/fj-low-profile - It has a full mesh floor and is 48 wide by 82 long so it should fit my suburban well.
Now the trick is how do I mount it? I have come up with some possible options:

1) Have a welder make me custom mount bracket – How much do you think this will cost?
2) Modify the SmittyBuilt defender mounts for the Z-71 rack http://www.offroadunlimited.com/orustore/pc/viewContent.asp?idpage=5
3) Try to secure it to the current Crossbars? – Probably the worst option

What do you guys think? How would you get this done on your truck?
Rack Weighs 65 pounds

So Im back again after a successful endeavor. I used the ubolt method, (round ones b/c I couldn't get square ones in the right width. Turns out it didn't matter and the rack is unbelievably sturdy. Check it out and shoot me any questions in this thread
 
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atothez

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Cool - thanks. I would actually like to know a few things (would ove to have this thing still fit in the garage with my 3 inch lift
 

owl_93

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Cool - thanks. I would actually like to know a few things (would ove to have this thing still fit in the garage with my 3 inch lift
Yeah, mine doesn't fit in the garage anymore, but that's because I have a tiny little crappy duplex garage
 

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