Yakima High Roller Bike Rack
March 11, 2009
Get a start-of-season deal at REI.com – the High Roller for $179. Click here!
If your bike is your most treasured possession, chances are you’re riding it most of the time. At least I am – but when I’m not riding it, I like it to be riding on my car, so I can take it with me to ride later. Until this year, my bike had to ride IN my car, because I didn’t have an external bike rack that would carry my fancy pants full-suspension bike. Then Yakima hooked the Geargals up with the High Roller bike racks, and now my bike can ride in style.
The High Roller installs in a snap onto any type of crossbar. Mine went on my Yakima crossbars and, naturally, that worked really well. The High Roller has three mount points and just screws on, and has a cable lock to lock the rack onto the bars when there’s no bike in it. It took about ten minutes to put the High Roller on my car since I already had the crossbars on, and I’m pretty picky about getting everything even so you could probably install it in five minutes if you are less fussy. Putting the bike in the rack is super easy too – just put it in the gutters, push it against the front hoop, turn the knob until the back hoop tightens, and then ratchet the back wheel strap down. You’re done! Of course, if you’re not tall or if you have a tall car, getting the bike up there can be kind of a hassle. I struggled with it for a few minutes and ended up standing on a bucket (and bringing the bucket to the trail head to stand on as well) to get the bike up and down before remembering that my car has an adjustable suspension and would politely lower itself for me if I asked it nicely by pressing the “down” button (no, really, it really does have an adjustable suspension, it’s quite handy). When I first put my favorite bike up there, I was a little nervous driving off – it doesn’t really LOOK super secure in the High Roller, but trust me – if it’s properly mounted, it’s not going anywhere.
The High Roller is designed to not touch the bike frame, so if you love your bike, you’ll love the High Roller. My favorite thing about this type of rack is that I don’t have to take my front wheel off – that just makes for extra hassle and less bike time. I’m not crazy about the cable lock – it’s kind of a pain to lock and unlock it all the time, but if you don’t lock it to something, it will just flop around and bang up the top of your car. I’d much rather have some sort of wheel hoop locking mechanism or something. There’s probably a reason Yakima didn’t go for that option, but I don’t know what it is.
I also don’t quite understand what’s keeping someone from simply unscrewing the mount points and walking off with my bike rack with my bike attached to it (other than the fact that it’s probably a big hassle to carry a bike attached to a bike rack and then try to get the bike off it), but the “pain in the ass factor” is probably a significant one for most thieves so I’ll take my chances. The cable lock, like all locks Yakima, works with the standard Yakima SKS lock cores, which is handy if you’ve been sufficiently forward-thinking as to buy enough lock cores that are all keyed the same. I didn’t, so I had to use a different key for my bike racks, but there’s probably a way to buy more lock cores keyed to your existing lock cores. But it’s bike season now and I’m too busy biking to go look that up for you, so you’re on your own.
Yakima SkyBox Gear Hauler
November 30, 2008
You know the feeling – you get some gear here, some gear there, some more gear, some gear that was on sale, some gear that you got from your buddy who switched to telemarking – and suddenly the gear situation is at critical mass. You want to go on an adventure but your car won’t carry all the gear for all the adventures you want to have. There is just not enough room. The doors won’t shut and there is no room for actual people in the car anyway. What is a Geargal to do?
And that is where the SkyBox comes in. If you are lucky enough to live in an outdoorsy type of town, you have probably seen eight million of these things, on all types of cars, from Subarus to Expeditions (seriously. If you own an Expedition and still need a cargo box, you have a problem). And for good reason – the SkyBox is seriously handy for hauling skis, shovels, snow saws, luggage, backpacks, tools – anything you might need for a trip or two or five. I love the SkyBox because I can throw all the sharp, dirty, poky things in it instead of having to stuff them into my nice new car. And my dog loves it too, because he gets to ride in comfort in the car while the gear is safely ensconced in the SkyBox. It really is much safer to have the gear in the box instead of in the car – high speed impacts (and even low speed impacts) can toss stuff around if it’s loose in the car. Better to have it safely stowed.
I admit that I enlisted the help of an experienced Yakima rack system putter-onner when installing the rack system and the SkyBox on my car. It was really pretty simple to install, but having another person was really helpful and eliminated about seven thousand trips to the other side of my car to make sure everything was even. And it really was quite nice to have him just show me how to install things like lock cores instead of having to read the directions, which my readers know I hate to do. So we got the base rack system and the SkyBox installed in about forty minutes, which is really pretty good for two people who are uptight enough to try to get everything exactly perfectly even down to the millimeter. The SkyBox itself just basically slides onto the crossbars and snaps tight, and when you lock the box, it keeps anyone from being able to just walk up and steal your precious gear hauler (assuming you’ve also put locks on your crossbars to keep someone from stealing THEM).
The Skybox is cool because it can open from either side, so you can put it on either side of your car (or in the middle, and access it from either side) and has a stiff lid for easy open and close. To open, twist the handle and pull up, and to close, just push down until the latch catches. Then lock and go. Simple. You can go with the low-pro look of the black matte SkyBox, or the bling of the SkyBox Pro – they are the same thing, only the Pro has a silver top. I went with the regular black, because I’m stealth like that. I also appreciate that the silver “SkyBox” sticker can be easily removed for ninjas like me.
Best of all, the SkyBox holds a really incredible amount of stuff. I tested the SkyBox 12 and and let me tell you, this thing can fit a lot of gear. It is enormous. I haven’t even really maxed it out yet; it is cavernous. I almost went with the SkyBox 16, which is even bigger, but I’m happy with the 12 since I like to have extra room on my crossbars. If all you need is a ski carry, the SkyBox 12 might prove a little big for your needs, but if you’re ever going to be carrying packs or luggage, you will love the extra room. People like me, who like a clean car, will go nuts over the SkyBox. Finally I have a means by which to keep people from throwing their crap all over my car – the rule in the Head Geargal’s car is if it doesn’t belong to me, it goes “In The Box”. Don’t even try to put your snowy boots on my back seat. That leather ain’t cheap and I don’t want to ride home in a stuffy car with your smelly boots. In the box!
I wasn’t able to use the spoiler with the SkyBox – it just wouldn’t fit on there all together and the spoiler was too close to the sunroof on my car. I was worried about wind noise without the spoiler, but either my car is super airtight or the wind noise isn’t that bad, because I’m not bothered. It’s noiser than it is without the box on there, but not disturbingly so. And finally I can carry my grain scoop shovel wherever I go! What – you think I’m kidding?
