gwhiztink noticed my homemade roof rack.  I thought I had posted pictures, but it was a long while over a year ago and before I was familiar with photobucket.

So here's some pic's.  http://s305.photobucket.com/albums/nn204/jayinbarrie/Roof%20Rack/

I'm lucky to have a cousin who's good at bending & welding, and was able to save some STAINLESS 1" tubing from his work.

When we built it I looked alot at the Sidekick roof rack.  There's one cross peice at the roof, two L peices that come up the back and bolt to the cross peice, and one straight peice that I clamp on with diagonaly with 2" muffler clamps (2" curve on a 45 is same as 2" curve).  If I would do this again, I would have the L peices come up and bolt just under the cross peice.  The rear straight peice could then be moved forward and back while staying level with the front cross peice.

I had a neighbour weld up a little reciever for the front.  I made a big T out of pipe to be level with the roof rack.  This was so I could strap on my little Laser sailboat (14" 130lbs).  Looked funny since the boat is just a bit longer then the Tracker.  The T was definetly needed to spread out the weight and secure the front of the boat.

The wife do's NOT help with getting it up and down.  The T has wheels that clip on, so I use it as a dolly to get the boat beside the Tracker.  I swing the stern (rear) of the boat up with the bow (front) still on the ground.  The T is then move to the front and secured.  I then lift the bow and swing it to the front of the Tracker on the T.  Lots of straps to keep it looking safe.

On my rack I have pipe insulation for the cross peices.  I don't know why but the pipe HOWLS when driving highway speed.  The insulation get rid of the noise.

I'm doing a bunch of work on her now, so it'll be a bit different for this summer.

That looks great!  I have the exact same tracker as you - black, 2 door, bfg AT's, manual hubs, hard top.

I noticed in your one picture that shows the latch area inside the rear door that you have what looks like a little rust developing.  I've got it much worse in the same spot - a fist size hole.  Going to have to fix that this summer.  Seems to be rusting from the inside out.  One day it looked like I had a little rusty paint bubble in that area so I, of course, had to touch it.  When I poked it, my finger went straight through the body!

Thanks, I'll check it out.

She's gonna look a lot different this summer, once I get her out of the garage.  OME springs, 3" BL, finishing lifting the gas tank, cousin made up some bumper just gotta bolt them on, 33" tires with 1.5" rim spacer in the front.  I better take some more pictures  .

Last fall I helped with the "economic stimulus" and bought a new family car.  A little 2 door convertable is kinda small, even for a family of 3.  So the Tracker is no longer a DD .