Hi all,

Although I am yet to purchase an RRS, one thing I will need to do when I get it is mount my roof tent on it - a Maggiolina Safari model, currently used on my RR Classic:

Click image to enlarge

Click image to enlarge

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You really need to pop over to disco3 site Mike

The exbo rack (G4 style) is the same so probably some more "off road camping" types on there than on here  RRS gone
Audi SQ5...Gone Audi Q7 S-Line 240 3.0TDI Gone
Audi A6 Allroad Sport 270 3.0TDI

An unmodified Expedition rack won't be wide or long enough - the upper surround curves inward too far. I'm considering cutting mine off to fit the roof tent.

Cheers,

Gordon 2015 RRS SDV6 SE, Santorini Black, GOE 2-way HS rods, Traxide dual battery, 275/55R20 Nitto TerraGraplers

2015 Discovery 4 SDV6 HSE - GOE 3-way HS rods, GOE underbody plates and sliders, 275/65R18 Courgia MT

Why not just put on two or three cross bars on the RRS and bolt your roof top to that as you have done on your classic.

Garry 07MY RRS TDV6
Arctic Frost
Aspen Interior

disco4x4au wrote:

An unmodified Expedition rack won't be wide or long enough - the upper surround curves inward too far. I'm considering cutting mine off to fit the roof tent.

Cheers,

Gordon

When i bought my sport - we sold our safari tent (same as yours) for a number of reasons we didnt want it on the top of the sport and didnt want to buy the roof bars (as i think it spoils the look) as well as it didnt seem right.

Anyway - we sold it to a Disco 4 owner and i helped him fit it.

You will need to drill the cross rails of your genuine land rover roof rack to allow the mountings for the safari tent to fit - on the D4 it works ok...there were some points to note and it took a bit of fiddling, equally it was tight when thinking about the boot opening - i have heard the generally the GPS signal can be a little degraded with stuff on the roof.

All done on just the two roof rails which seemed to work and i think its used just on the two. on a modern land rover im not sure if you need the same rigidity for off roading (are you going to off road heavily in you sport?) that you needed on a RRC - you can run the tent on two - we ran it on 2 for 18months on the TDCi defender. Mike

2014 Facelift Discovery

mse wrote:

im not sure if you need the same rigidity for off roading (are you going to off road heavily in you sport?)

We may still be in the minority, but we do off road just as heavily in our L322RR (and would in a sport as well if we owned one ). So much so, that I even became involved in making and selling an ultra-portable diagnostic system to avoid getting stuck miles from civilization because of an errant electronic fault - see sig below.

The trouble with trying to use 3 cross bars is the curvature of the roof. The expedition rack follows these contours whereas a RTT won't. To get around this problem when we moved up from a RRC to a P38 I had to build a rack that was taller at both ends than in the middle (I posted pics on rr.net several years ago if anyone is really interested). You could go to a welder and have something similar made up using mounting blocks like the expedition rack. This would be the most solid mounting system. But you are only using 2 crossbars on your RRC, so if these sufficed there 2 will likely suffice on your RRS as well. I'd look to see what options you have in crossbars - Thule, Rhino Rack, etc - and buy a dedicated set for the RTT.


Nice RRC, BTW, looks just like one of mine (I never sell my old cars - just add to the collection ).
Tires look to be the same size as I have too - 245/75 16s? 
gap-diagnostic.com

If there is a need to use three cross rails, in Aust you can buy aftermarket cross bars for the RRS that take the roof curve into account - the middle one is standard height and the end ones have special spacers - however if the load capacity of the roof rack, the tracks and the roof itself three rails are not normally needed.

Extensive outback travel by RRS owners in Aust (not me) has shown that two bars work fine.

Garry 07MY RRS TDV6
Arctic Frost
Aspen Interior

That is interesting, Garry. Do you know who makes this? 
gap-diagnostic.com

When I bought my Rhino Tracks the salesman said I could fit three bars by using Rhino height spacers on the end cross bars - I did not follow up any further as I do not think I need three cross bars.

I think the salesperson was referring to these.

http://www.rhinorack.com.au/AccSubCategory..._1_29.aspx

Garry 07MY RRS TDV6
Arctic Frost
Aspen Interior

There you go! Great.

garrycol wrote:

Extensive outback travel by RRS owners in Aust (not me) has shown that two bars work fine.

Garry

It depends on how much weight you have on top. We have fold out RTT's rather than the shell type like Mike has in the pic above, and if we have only one tent we sometimes use the left over space for other items such as jerry cans or such which can get quite heavy. If we are underway with the 2 kids, we have 2 RTTs. Either way it can get heavy and I prefer to have as many mounting points as possible.

Static loads (4 people sleeping on the roof) are not a problem; you have to consider the dynamic loads. As you cross surface irregularities the roof load is often trying to move in a very different direction to the vehicle. Go through a large pothole at any sort of speed and as you exit, the 75kg roof load will still be trying to head down as the vehicle is already bouncing back up. And then take this picture to an extreme on a washboard piste.

I enjoy travel and I enjoy working on cars, but not at the same time . So I try to make my vehicle relatively bulletproof, if possible. 
gap-diagnostic.com

Mike C.

Did you manage to find a mounting solution for your magolina? I've just purchased a Columbus Variant XL for my Discovery but would like to use it from time to time on my RRSC.

The Discovery uses a roofrack so I'm also in the market for a RRSC rooftent mounting system now.

Thx. Ra-Ro Sport Super Dooper Charged.
Ford F350 Super Duty Prototype.
Ni$$@n Patrol 4.8 Overlander.

Sorry for the delayed reply guys, but thanks for all the views and ideas!

In the end, to mount the roof tent I removed the G4 roof rack and fitted a pair of standard LR roof bars. I was concerned these would not be strong enough, but they were perfectly acceptable and survived all the offroading in Morocco plus two adults (circa 30 stone combined weight) sleeping in it every night for 2-3 weeks.

If you were looking to put more weight than that on there I would advise a third roof bar for peace of mind, although the curvature of the roof may affect this depending on your tent. However, with two roof bars we have no problems in either static conditions (i.e. us in it) or dynamic conditions (i.e,. offroading).

Here it is mounted on the roof of the RRS:

Click image to enlarge

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Looks good!

Now some action pics.

As I posted above, static loads (people sleeping in the tent) are not going to be the problem. A washboard piste is. But newer roof racks with cast bits are completely different than the stamped metal racks of days gone by. Nevertheless, I usually carry a spare 'foot' just in case ('course I would never break a foot unless I didn't have the spare... ) 
gap-diagnostic.com

Last edited by stevemfr on Mon Nov 05 2012 1:33pm. Edited 1 time in total

Steve

Can I ask if the update is still available at just postage costs (EASControl)

(Sorry for thread hijack Mike) RRS gone
Audi SQ5...Gone Audi Q7 S-Line 240 3.0TDI Gone
Audi A6 Allroad Sport 270 3.0TDI