In my efforts to ruggedize my Highlander I spent many frustrating hours, maybe even days, looking for a roof rack. Most of the time, they were disgustingly over priced, or super cheap, poorly made racks that would crumple in fear if anything touched it and shortly rust as soon as somebody breathed on it. Those that were somewhat decent were very tiny, and served no point other than to carry a small parcel.

That just would not do.

I wanted a full length, full strength chest-thumping roof rack that could carry all our gear, including a large tent, tools, boats, as well as lots of lumber when I one day decide to build a robust shed that may double as a bunker. Without spending thousands. Preferable as close to free as possible.

So after having spent countless hours trawling through online-metals.com and Mcmaster carr (both of which are excellent websites by the way) trying to create the ultimate budget roof rack, then shaking my fist as the price quickly grows beyond my reach, I came across a pinterest post where somebody had mocked something up using a section of fence.

That was the spark, and so off I went to Lowes to see what was available. Lo and behold, there it hung in the outdoor section, just the right length, a nice powdercoated black, $85. Walking around the rest of the store, I found some suitable U bolts, and washers to secure it safely to the roof rails. In total, I was $115 by the time I left the store.

After placing the rack on top of the roof, it fitted with about a ¼ inch overhang on each side of the roof-rail. It was however a bit long, so I had to cut it down by about 9 inches.

After that was fixed, I needed a wind deflector. I sourced a wind deflector from my old Yakima rack. It was kind of beat up so I resprayed it black and mocked up a quick SOMEVSNONE logo.

Of course the beams on the rack were too small for the wind deflector mounts. Thankfully, I have access to a 3D printer so I was able to create some adapter plates. If you don’t have access to that, and are feeling crafty, you can likely do a similar thing with a 1 inch wood dowel.

The u-bolts did not perfectly align when clamping down between the roof rails and the rack, so I had to head back to Lowes to get a basic ⅛ inch thick aluminum bar to span the cross beams of the rack/fence section. After cutting it to a suitable length (I winged that part) I cut out some through-holes for the U-bolt to go through, and it did the job.

With the rack in place, I saw that the U-bolts stuck out a bit more than desired, and any soft bags I might put up there, could potentially get torn. I mocked up some 3d printed soft rounded grips that I melt-fitted onto the nuts that were heated in the oven. A simple solution here would be to trim down the U-bolts, and get some matching wing-nuts if you don’t have access to a 3d printer.

That problem solved, I did a test drive with the rack on and noticed that it resonated like a big flute. The straight square sections of the fence post that ran from the front of the car to the back was causing the loud howl so that had to be plugged up. I did look for standard plastic plugs in the right size, but could not find anything that quite matched so thankfully, back to the 3d printer to create some friction fit plugs. Non-3D printer solution would be some clean placement of black duck-tape, or hammer in some wood plugs. After this, the noise from the roof was pretty much non-existent.

So how has it fared? Well a week after installing it, I loaded it with close to 250lbs worth of gear for a trip out to family property and while of course the Highlander feeling slightly top-heavy, it rode nicely, with no road noise. The rack held up nicely, using ratchet straps, bungee cords, and a bungee net to hold down anything else. More recently, on a road trip to Florida, I didn’t necessarily need to bring it, but I took the opportunity to use it in conjunction with my roof-box to see how it fitted. It also gave me the option to load up with more bags in case we came home with larger souvenirs.

The benefit of this particular fence section was that there were plenty of rails to mount to, which is of course great, and if I want, I can easily upgrade it with an awning or a modified pvc pipe for holding water. Really, the possibilities are endless, which is kind of the point of these things.

I hope that this has brought some inspiration to you to build one yourself. One day I might buy one of the more expensive roof racks, but until then, I think this budget rack will do the job nicely.