Just got a new 2020 LE yesterday. This is our second Sienna. We put 250K miles on a 2009 and went back for more.
The roof rack on the 2020 is a disappointment. It wasn't great on our 2009, but it was better. We kayak and generally used the roof rack for all kinds of things (like getting plywood and lumber from Home Depot), while not idea, the 2009 was usable. The best system I've had to date was on a 2009 Nissan Pathfinder we owned, not too high and nicely adjustable from front to back.
OK, so, I am an aerospace engineer and have access to some pretty cool manufacturing equipment. I want to modify my 2020 Sienna to have a roof system that is truly flexible and usable. This is likely to require designing and machining a bunch of custom parts. That's OK. We are keeping this vehicle for a while and truly want it to be as useful as possible.
My first thought was that it would be great to have something as conceptually system as full length t-slot rails instead of the half length things with low flexibility I got with the car.
The most obvious go-to for any engineer when it comes to t-slot systems are these extrusions (made by a bunch of companies):
Roughly speaking, the roofline is eight feet long, so each rail of the above profile would weigh-in at eight lbs. I haven't removed the OEM rails but can imagine them being in that range.
There are other options within that family:
Something slim like this:
Or super-beefy like this:
What I am thinking is that, rather than design a rack or rack system, what I want to do is design a set of mounting brackets that would allow anyone to use any of the t-slot extrusions to build whatever rack system they might need. One obvious example of this is something like the Yakima roof rack platform, which uses custom t-slotted extrusions (likely not compatible with standard t-slots).
Engineering t-slot extrusions are available in multiples of 1 inch or 1.5 inches for imperial measurements (1x1, 1.5x1.5, 1.5x3, etc.) and multiples of 20 and 40 mm for metric versions.
What I imagine are bolt plates machined from aluminum that would bolt on to the existing rack's bolt points. In the front I would design a matching bolt plate, the difference being that the roof would have to be drilled for mounting these plates. There are engineering-grade adhesives that might be able to do the job without drilling and bolting but I would very much hesitate to take this path without very extensive thermal and simulated aging testing. In other words, the safest approach is likely to be to drill through the roof. and use bolts.
The tops of these adaptor plates would be machined to be on the same level. This means that you could slide through a 1.5 x 1.5 in t-slotted pipe and it would be perfectly straight.
With t-slot rails on each side one could take racking to any imaginable level. I used to row shells years ago. A short recreational shell is in the range of 17 feet and something like a Maas is in the order of 24 feet. With solid mount points on the roof a t-slot rack system could be created to elegantly address shells as well as shorter (11 foot) Ocean Kayak's as well as other non-boating equipment.
I am also looking for an easy to manage system to get kayaks on and off the Sienna. The vehicle is very high putting things up there is a pain. The Yakima and Thule kayak racks that tilt down for waist-level loading are good (yet expensive) ideas. Maybe there's a way to use an adaptable t-slot-based system to achieve something similar at a lower cost.
Anyhow, I am wondering what other owners think about this. I need this solution for my own purposes and wills start working on it right away. Has anyone done anything like this? Maybe I am reinventing the wheel?
Thanks,
-Martin
The roof rack on the 2020 is a disappointment. It wasn't great on our 2009, but it was better. We kayak and generally used the roof rack for all kinds of things (like getting plywood and lumber from Home Depot), while not idea, the 2009 was usable. The best system I've had to date was on a 2009 Nissan Pathfinder we owned, not too high and nicely adjustable from front to back.
OK, so, I am an aerospace engineer and have access to some pretty cool manufacturing equipment. I want to modify my 2020 Sienna to have a roof system that is truly flexible and usable. This is likely to require designing and machining a bunch of custom parts. That's OK. We are keeping this vehicle for a while and truly want it to be as useful as possible.
My first thought was that it would be great to have something as conceptually system as full length t-slot rails instead of the half length things with low flexibility I got with the car.
The most obvious go-to for any engineer when it comes to t-slot systems are these extrusions (made by a bunch of companies):
Roughly speaking, the roofline is eight feet long, so each rail of the above profile would weigh-in at eight lbs. I haven't removed the OEM rails but can imagine them being in that range.
There are other options within that family:
Something slim like this:
Or super-beefy like this:
What I am thinking is that, rather than design a rack or rack system, what I want to do is design a set of mounting brackets that would allow anyone to use any of the t-slot extrusions to build whatever rack system they might need. One obvious example of this is something like the Yakima roof rack platform, which uses custom t-slotted extrusions (likely not compatible with standard t-slots).
Engineering t-slot extrusions are available in multiples of 1 inch or 1.5 inches for imperial measurements (1x1, 1.5x1.5, 1.5x3, etc.) and multiples of 20 and 40 mm for metric versions.
What I imagine are bolt plates machined from aluminum that would bolt on to the existing rack's bolt points. In the front I would design a matching bolt plate, the difference being that the roof would have to be drilled for mounting these plates. There are engineering-grade adhesives that might be able to do the job without drilling and bolting but I would very much hesitate to take this path without very extensive thermal and simulated aging testing. In other words, the safest approach is likely to be to drill through the roof. and use bolts.
The tops of these adaptor plates would be machined to be on the same level. This means that you could slide through a 1.5 x 1.5 in t-slotted pipe and it would be perfectly straight.
With t-slot rails on each side one could take racking to any imaginable level. I used to row shells years ago. A short recreational shell is in the range of 17 feet and something like a Maas is in the order of 24 feet. With solid mount points on the roof a t-slot rack system could be created to elegantly address shells as well as shorter (11 foot) Ocean Kayak's as well as other non-boating equipment.
I am also looking for an easy to manage system to get kayaks on and off the Sienna. The vehicle is very high putting things up there is a pain. The Yakima and Thule kayak racks that tilt down for waist-level loading are good (yet expensive) ideas. Maybe there's a way to use an adaptable t-slot-based system to achieve something similar at a lower cost.
Anyhow, I am wondering what other owners think about this. I need this solution for my own purposes and wills start working on it right away. Has anyone done anything like this? Maybe I am reinventing the wheel?
Thanks,
-Martin
