[JmZ]

Got a roof rack for the wife's Mini-Van last month.

Put a Yakima on a Mazda MPV (2003 model) with the standard clips and towers routine. Read the instructions and put it on as instructed. It is secure.

After our first big rain it leaked, so I put some extra weather stripping on the inside of the doors, and it leaked just a little bit less.

I'm looking for options.

I figure my options probably start with...
1) Take it to a local shop and have them 'professionally' install it. Then dump a bucket of water on it to see if it still leaks. E-Mail Yakima concurrently to see if I'm doing something wrong.

2) Sell the towers, go to the Mazda dealership and have factory rails put on the van and then purchase the rail rider towers from Yakima and re-install.

3) Put a hitch on the van and get a hitch mounted rack and sell off the roof rack.

Anyone else have similar problems, and if so... how the heck do you solve 'em? I want the roof rack on the van so I can take the bikes when going places with the kids, but it currently aint looking promising.

Help.

JmZ

 

[sonyisdope]

I have had that problem with my Mazda Protege5 oddly enough. I ended up returning my Yakima rack, and just bought the adapters to put the Yakima Upright mounts onto my factory rack, and that works great! I think the weight is limited on the factory racks though, but if you will only be carrying a couple bikes on it, should be no problem.

 

[sonyisdope]

One more thing. . .with Mazdas, you do not need the "rail riders" from Yakima, they make an adapter that will let you mount Yakima products directly to the factory Mazda or Ford product rails. When I bought my bike mounts, they actually came with MPV mounts, and I had to have them resend me the Protege5 mounts. I'm sorry, but I threw away the MPV mounts, but I know they make them. So. . .all you should really need from Yakima is the bike mounts, and the roof rack adapters. From Mazda you just need the cross bars that go into the tracks on your roof. Very simple to set up, carwash safe (I tested it myself!), and it also looks a lot cleaner too!