By Tony K
Because I camp with my wagon and have wife, kids and dog in tow, I needed additional storage and the roof is the most obvious place to go. My roof rack is a standard Yakima with a few changes. I added the side bars to keep trees from going between the towers and causing some destruction. For ease of maintenance they just bolt to the ends of the crossbars. I also used some Yakima hardware in some unorthodox ways. A couple of hold downs with bolts are used to hold my Hi lift down and the rear basket is held up by one crossbar and bolted to the back of the Load Warrior at the front. A fabricated bracket holds a shovel on the opposite side and a couple of lights at the back finish things off. After this set up got me through Rubicon, Eric discovered in the manual for Yakima racks, they are not intended for off road use. Just might have to argue that one.
Rear Tire and Fuel Can Racks are nearly a necessity on a wagon. I never did like the idea of keeping the tire underneath the rig. More than likely the only time you will ever get a flat is when you are dressed nice and then what do you do. If your me you move the tire to a better place. The other thing to consider is placement of the tire. And there are two points to pay attention to. Just how high the tire rides on the rack and the left right orientation. When I first made the tire carrier it sat too low and dragged over a few obstacles. Moved it up about 6 ins, now the bottom of the tire is just a bit above the bottom of the tail gate and I don’t think it has dragged once. While I am a fan of the centered spare tire, it just isn’t practical when it comes to visibility out the back of the rig. Keeping it on the left side allows you to look out the back of the rig on the highway for lane changes or backing up in the woods. Other than seeing it in the rearview mirror you will hardly notice it when it is directly behind you.
The combination fuel can storage rack has gotten the heck used out of it. Not only does it hold 3 Jerry cans but I can put a propane bottle on it, or a 5 gallon water cooler, or storage crate while keeping one of the cans in place. I also have an additional section that mounts above the cans to hold another crate. Slots cut in it allow me to put a chainsaw with a 24in bar safely in it as well. An unexpected bonus of the upper rack is that it blocks access to the caps on my Nato style Jerry cans. You can’t open them with the upper rack in place.
And for that occasional need I also can plug a bike rack into the upper section. Capping things off in the back is a container to hold the spout for my fuel cans, which keeps the smell of fuel out of the cab, and some welded on tabs to wrap the winch cable around if I don’t want to rewind it in the middle of a run.
Both sections swing out on pivots to access the back of the rig. A fabricated latch holds them closed. I drilled holes for locking pins but I have never had the need to use them.
