General Warning! Roof rails problem!

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General Warning! Roof rails problem!

hcampian

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Mar 27, 2007
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Bucharest
Hello!

While I was driving with some bikes on the roof bars of my Panda, the front part of the left roof rail (the factory fitted one) got loose. It seems that the screw that is used to fit it came loose. All the left part of the entire bike roof rack felt onto the car and there is some minor damage to the car roof.

The problem is that the bikes could fall and this is not a good idea on the motorway at 60+ mph.

I would certainly advise everyone who is using the roof rails for some kind of roof rack to check the screws and maybe even add some kind of gel on the screws to get them properly connected to the roof, and then it should never happen.

My car has 16.000 miles of which I drove 12500 miles with bikes, skis or a box on the roof. So it could happen on a heavy use.

If someone is interested I could post a picture of the damage.

Have a nice day (better then mine)!
 
Here are some pics of the accident :eek:. The solution will be to dispose the roof rails and to install new roof bars that will fit directly on the car roof. The rails looked nice :cry: ...





 
have to be honest, cant figure it out, i think i'm being thick and tired..

so you had the normal factory fitted longitudinal bars, and fitted a rack with transverse bars to it, and the long bars came loose?
 
Yes, the front part of the left factory fitted bar came loose and I lost it on the road. I checked the other 3 screws and they were also loose.

So everyone should check and tighten the original long bars connections to the roof before using it. It's a quite simple operation and should prevent this kind of accident form happening.
 
Looking at it i couldn't fathom it out either?
But now you mention the middle section was lost, well that is plain scary.
Imagine your bikes falling into the path of say, a motorcyclist. Say no more:eek:.
A lucky (but not so lucky ) escape.
 
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