Mighty Mount Strenghts and Weaknesses
Clamping something to a factory roof rack should be simpler than it is. The biggest problem is with the near universal horrifically poor design of factory racks. They are all designed for looks, not usability. Their secondary design driver is noise generation, which is closely tied to drag and impact on mileage due to wind resistance. More noise equates to more drag. As a result, the common flaws in terms of usability as a rack to carry things are fourfold. 1, The cross bars seldom slide in tracks. Older designs sometimes slide, but have other issues. 2, The cross bars are curved, thus inducing an angle to any attaching clamp. 3, The rails are often not parallel (hence the absence of slide tracks for the crossbars). 4, The cross bars do not have a standard profile such as one gets with Yakima and Thule systems.
The Mighty Mount concept does not overcome any of the first three big issues. It only deals with the fourth, the lack of a common profile to factory cross bars. The first generation Mighty Mounts were clearly superior from the point of view of the user. They came in a huge variety of shapes to precisely fit specific factory cross bars. And, since many current cross bars happen to be very close to some of the older ones, if you can figure out which older model Mighty Mount fits your bars, assuming that one does, then getting on ebay and getting a set of those is the best way to go. That said, there is no guide available for this, and you are talking about used or older parts. You might have to buy two or three older ones just to figure out which model will work with your current rack, or even if one will work, then you might have to buy a couple sets of those to get a full set in good shape. Someone should write a guide and put up a web site that has this information.
The Universal Mighty Mount solves the problem by making it possible to buy one kit that can be adapted to almost any cross bar design. It saves Yakima a ton of money by not having to design new parts every time a new factory roof rack design appears, and it saves their dealers a whole lot of shelf space and inventory cost. Also, since the Universal version of the Mighty Mount has a lot more parts, they can justify a much larger price point making more money for both Yakima and the dealers, even though the difference between the cost of goods sold and the common sales price for these things must be a 1000% or more. But, they work.
So let's talk about the down side of using Mighty Mounts at all (Universal or the older style). If the cross bars are curved, as most factory cross bars are, then the two mounting bolts sticking up from one pair of mounts on the same bar are not going to be parallel. Getting something like a roof top box on and off of them is going to be a pain and doing it without scratching your roof is not going to be easy. This is because the Mighty Mounts have to be loose so they can move as the box is lowered onto them. As the bolt slides into its hole, the Mighty Mount has to slide toward the center of the vehicle. Then you finish tightening the Mighty Mount's thumb wheel after the box is in place. But, having that bolt that points down toward your paint loose during this operation is a risk - not a big one, but a real one. It really helps to have two people when mounting a roof top box.
The other down side issue with using mighty mounts comes from the fact that those factory roof rack cross bars do not slide. That means that if you are mounting something that has fixed mounting holes spanning the two cross bars, the chances of those holes being in the right place is pretty much zero. Things like roof top boxes and the channel style of bike rack end up having more holes drilled in them to line-up with the Mighty Mount bolts. That said, for something like ski racks and kayak saddles which don't care about the fore-aft spacing, they work great.
I've had more than a dozen different vehicles with various roof racks and I have used them to carry just about every outdoor travel and sports toy there is. My strongest recommendation is to avoid factory racks in the first place, and get Yakima tracks installed on your vehicle after deliver. Then you can use standard Rail Rider towers, and round bars and everything is super easy. My second choice go ahead and work with the factory roof rack, and use Yakima's Low Rider adapters to put on some round cross bars that are then flat and easily adjustable fore and aft. This approach costs more, but is worth it, and something like a roof top box actually sits lower than it would with Mighty Mounts because of that curve in most factory bars combined with the height of the Universal Mighty Mount will push your thing higher by at least an inch. Yakima and Thule no longer sell their shorter cross bars, but you can always use a hack saw to trim the bars they do sell to just the right size for your vehicle and what you want to carry on it.
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