Thule bike rack on Subaru?

[Tom Reingold]

I had a Thule rack on my Saab. It has square rails. Is there a way to
use the Thule type bike trays, somehow, on the Subaru roof rack?

A URL might be all I need. I browsed throough Thule's site, and it
didn't help.

Thanks.

 

[l.lichtman]

Tom Reingold wrote: (clip) Is there a way to use the Thule type bike
trays, somehow, on the Subaru roof rack? (clip)
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
Since no one else has jumped in here, I will. The answer is yes. With
a little ingenuity you can do anything you want. I have a pair of
Yakima round cross rails attached to my Outback, on which I am using
one Yakima and two Thule carriers. The round Yakima bars are held to
the car rack with stock Yakima "towers." (That's what they call them.)
I am sure you can buy Thule towers to fit your square cross rails. My
Thule bike racks are held to the round Yakima bars with U-bolts, and it
works just fine, but I'm only mentioning that to make the point that
you are not restricted to standard fittings. Use whatever works.

 

[Tom Reingold]

Tom Reingold wrote: (clip) Is there a way to use the Thule type bike
trays, somehow, on the Subaru roof rack? (clip)
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
Since no one else has jumped in here, I will. The answer is yes. With
a little ingenuity you can do anything you want. I have a pair of
Yakima round cross rails attached to my Outback, on which I am using
one Yakima and two Thule carriers. The round Yakima bars are held to
the car rack with stock Yakima "towers." (That's what they call them.)
I am sure you can buy Thule towers to fit your square cross rails. My
Thule bike racks are held to the round Yakima bars with U-bolts, and it
works just fine, but I'm only mentioning that to make the point that
you are not restricted to standard fittings. Use whatever works.

Maybe I didn't describe things well enough. I have a Subaru rack on my
new Subaru, and I want a bike rack on this new car. The rails are oblong
shaped. Would I replace this whole thing with my old Thule rack, or can
I somehow adapt it? If so, where?

Thanks again.

 

[Hallan Blaggit]

I'm not sure what the problem is...Thule makes adapters for
everything.

Go to www.thuleracks.com, pick "rack my car" or whatever, pick the
year of your subie, and the model, and then "does your car have a
factory rack"....and then pick "bike"....and keep going. Its
extremely easy, they have all the adapters.

You may have to do some digging depending on what model of subie you
have, and what model of bike rack you have.

I like Thule because they are so versatile - the same rack that fits
my wife's 03 Corolla also fits my 98 Legacy wagon (no factory rack),
with the only change being the fit kit ($45)...

 

[Ken Lyons]

I had a Thule rack on my Saab. It has square rails. Is there a way to
use the Thule type bike trays, somehow, on the Subaru roof rack?

I too had leftover Thule fork-mounts and trays.There are two choices 1) Buy
a kit that replaces the oblong Subaru bars; 2) Buy a bike tray that attaches
to the oblong Subaru bars. I went with 1) because I wanted to mount a box as
well as the bike trays and choice 2) seemed to preclude mounting anything
other than the trays. It is a little confusing at first, but does all come
together if you spend enough time scratching your head.

Let's see if I can make this work right.
The Rapid Railing kit:
http://www.thuleracks.com/thule/images/products/751xt.jpg
The Factory Direct Mount (notice the additional square bar above the front
Subie oblong bar making it difficult to mount a level box):
http://www.thuleracks.com/thule/images/products/889.jpg

 

[steve ball]

If you kept the rack, you can just replace the towers on your Thule rack to fit
the Subaru rack.

That's what I did with the Yakima "Low Riders" (I've got Yak Racks) If all you
want to do is haul bikes, you can get the oblong clips to fit factory racks for
the "Big Mouth or Velo Vice" racks.

Steve