The story of the ROOF RACK!

So, because the camper was absolutely buggered, engine wise, when I bought her, and this I found out when I got stuck on the highway for 5 hours driving her from Lenasia home to Randburg, I did try and fix her,but that turned out to be an idiotic idea, so,we finally decided a new engine was needed, remember the old Bubbles ll?

My new baby had her spare tyre on the front, but once we fitted her with her brand new 2.2 Y Toyota engine, we had to add a radiator in the front where the tyre used to be and this left us with a slight dilemma of what to do with the spare.

One option was to assume that I will never get a flat tyre and just leave the spare at home, apparently this option was not recommended, especially as I no longer have a home to leave it in, second option was to carry it inside, this would seriously dent the space the dogs would have to roam their new home and find spacious spots to sleep in where they would not be on top of each other, it is after all a very big spare wheel!!, THIRD OPTION WAS TO FIT A ROOF RACK AND PUT IT UP THERE, so this is the one we went with, I mean, how difficult can putting on a roof rack be?

I perused the Internet to find a roof rack, none to be found, no scrap yard had one, the 4x4 place could fit one for R5 000, the welding guy in Strydom park could do one for R3 000, but no guarantees, (of what I did not ask,) I got onto CES (community exchange) and found Munya, who came and bought some of my furniture for Talents and promised to come and fit my rack in exchange as it turned out, one of his specialities in life was welding, this was a long and convoluted story, and ended badly, still no rack.

Time was fleeting at this point and a plan had to be made, one of my tenants moved out and took some of my furniture with her, she promised to ask her brother, Lucky, who said he would bring along his welder and do the job, I am still waiting.

Finally, Johan and I decided to simply do the job ourselves, as we have already stated, how hard could it be?

I went along to NJR Steel and bought the steel, turned out to be too thick, too heavy and too little, but what the hell, use what we have and lets not make a big deal out of it, still a simple job.

So we grind the ends, lay it out, take out the old welder and weld away, it takes a full day to discover that welding isn't quite as simple as it looks in 'Footloose', so we don't get very far, but we still have time so we plan another day.

Day two and the welding goes on, I get up on the roof of the shed to waterproof it, and Johann has a stab at finishing the job. The old clamps we are using need a bit of oiling as they are rusted, so rusted that we eventually have to grind the bolts off and buy new ones, unfortunately, one of the bolt heads breaks off with our rough treatment so we have to drill it out, this proves difficult as none of our drill bits are small enough. We get tired and call it a day, time is still on our side so we plan another day.

Day three and our frame is complete, our clamps still need some work but we are going to circumvent all the challenges and simply fit the frame to the clamps and then weld the lot together and bugger all the silly bolts, great up until we discover that the clamps are not made of steel that are made of aluminum - and can therefore NOT BE WELDED. So passes another frustrating day of cursing, sweating and planning and getting not much further.

Day four, Johann has made a few plans, not a Dutchman for nothing, and we have drilled a hole in the frame and bolted the clamp to it so no weld necessary, unfortunately, he has buggered up all the drill bits in the process so hops off to buy himself a drill sharpener, this takes us about 4 hours to figure out, we sharpen a few bits and none work, the thick steel, the one I bought that was too thick remember? is simply too thick to drill through, so, off to the hardware, R100 bucks later we come home with new bits.

Well away we go, drilling and bolting to our hearts content, finally getting to the point where we can lift it onto the campers roof and fit the last of the holes for the last two clamps, and voila, the frame is heavy and too short sitting on top of the clamps and only fits one side, the roof of the camper is too round so back to the drawing board, we decide to add a spacer bar between the frame and the head of the clamp, this looks a lot better when we fit it but still a bit tight, denting the roof a bit, we say what the hell, we measure the holes, go off and drill them come back again, fit it, it doesn't fit so we hammer the parts that are proving stubborn, get the clamps hooked into the gutters tighten them up, check the roof isn't too damaged and take a deep breathe, well imagine our surprise when the rack is actually up, bolted tight and looking like a million bucks.

So we get the tyre up, this is not an easy job but we manage, and we chain it down, slip a cover over it, made from some old wannabe leopard skin bed cover and all looks great, finally we have achieved our objective, it only took 4 days, cost a lot of blood sweat and tears, we have scraped hands, burned fingers, steel filing splinters and lots of blisters, but I have learned how to grind, weld and swear profusely, not necessarily in that order - but our rack is fitted!

Now I have to hope I never get a flat wheel, because getting that tyre off the rack, is not a one man job and I may have to sit on the side of the road for a long time waiting for a knight in shining armour, but whatever, we are still proud of ourselves, now for the solar panels...........