Cosmetic Roof Rail Removal

( There may by posts about this but can't find any. )

Anybody done this themselves.

In preparation for fitting Thule load bearing rails I have been removing the A/S cosmetic ones. Out comes the hacksaw and file and 2 hours later nearly done (on one side).
The question I have which I hope some wise person can answer is-  Is there a way of detaching the last of the aluminium bracket from the roof i.e. solvent to loosen the sikaflex adhesive. (Prising is not an option)

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If not then I suppose they can stay there as no one can see them from the road.

You could try a wire saw
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Hi crosgor
Like the look of that but would damage the roof defo.  Will be purchasing one though as could be a life saver in another situation. Thanks for posting that link.

Sorry can't provide illustration, but if you search 'Formica Cutting Knife' or 'Utility blade for cutting laminate' it should show the tool much like a Stanly Knife that if you slide the blade out more for flexibility (breaks off in sections to retain sharp cut) carefully slice into the sealant without harming the surface of the roof. Hope this makes sense.

Hi Paramedic,
Being a chippy I know the tools you are on about. There is still to much risk of roof damage as probably only 1mm of adhesive filled gap. Thanks anyway.
  Think I'll just leave them.

Windy

Have you tried a steamer (you will need the jet nozzle) it certainly helps with silicon
Acetone will shift most glues if the steamer don't work
David

Hi Windy , we used to prepare cars for paintwork by removing items stuck to vehicle paintwork like spoilers, badges and splitters  that had been stuck on using various adhesives  by gently heating the area with a hair dryer until warm. This softens the adhesive enough to allow some strong fishing line to be slid in a sawing motion between the bracket and the roof like a cheese cutter. The nylon fishing line will not damage the roof. The aluminium brackets will absorb heat easily and help the process.

Hi windchippy. Not having a pop at you, but I thought this was a wind up when I read your post. I take it that you  know what you are doing? How could you possibly go down this road, rip off your roof bars not knowing the outcome of your mods, and now seek advice. Your 2016 Kemerton van is still under warranty as well. Any mods you make could cost you dear if you need to make a claim for water ingress among other things. Sorry mate I'm amazed and I would bet others will be.

Simmo wrote:Hi windchippy. Not having a pop at you, but I thought this was a wind up when I read your post. I take it that you  know what you are doing? How could you possibly go down this road, rip off your roof bars not knowing the outcome of your mods, and now seek advice. Your 2016 Kemerton van is still under warranty as well. Any mods you make could cost you dear if you need to make a claim for water ingress among other things. Sorry mate I'm amazed and I would bet others will be.

My thoughts exactly, sorry. I could be completely wrong, often am, but wont they have a bolt through and wont the new ones have to be bolted through which means getting to the inside.

Flaggy wrote:

Simmo wrote:Hi windchippy. Not having a pop at you, but I thought this was a wind up when I read your post. I take it that you  know what you are doing? How could you possibly go down this road, rip off your roof bars not knowing the outcome of your mods, and now seek advice. Your 2016 Kemerton van is still under warranty as well. Any mods you make could cost you dear if you need to make a claim for water ingress among other things. Sorry mate I'm amazed and I would bet others will be.

My thoughts exactly, sorry. I could be completely wrong, often am, but wont they have a bolt through and wont the new ones have to be bolted through which means getting to the inside.

Knowing that I would be carrying sea kayaks, I looked at this issue prior to ordering my Kingham and was advised that the upgrade to Fiamma load bearing longitudinal rails was best done at the factory build stage and prior to the internals (cupboards/wiring/roof lining etc) going in.

That's not to say that aftermarket systems can't be fitted, just a bit more to think about.

Windychippy, I note that you've only taken one side off at the moment and I don't know if Auto-Sleeper are the same, but on my Bolero, one of the roof rails had cabling running underneath it. 

Ken.

Hello to concerned members


Flaggy wrote:

Simmo wrote:Hi windchippy. Not having a pop at you, but I thought this was a wind up when I read your post. I take it that you  know what you are doing? How could you possibly go down this road, rip off your roof bars not knowing the outcome of your mods, and now seek advice. Your 2016 Kemerton van is still under warranty as well. Any mods you make could cost you dear if you need to make a claim for water ingress among other things. Sorry mate I'm amazed and I would bet others will be.

My thoughts exactly, sorry. I could be completely wrong, often am, but wont they have a bolt through and wont the new ones have to be bolted through which means getting to the inside


Hi.
I spent a fare bit of cash on the last van in sorting it to carry my water sports gear on the roof only to be told by "her who must be obeyed" that she will no longer camp in it because of the vans size (VW T5).  So on acquiring the Kemerton at a good price with rails already fitted I thought great.  It was only after joining this site and reading that the roof rails are only cosmetic that I decided to take drastic action (being a can do guy). 


The cosmetic rails have been carefully ( no ripping ) removed and the supporting brackets cut off just leaving the flat plate as in the photo. Each plate had one stainless bolt which didn't seem to be tight at all, just held in place by sikaflex. Bolts now removed and holes sealed, much like all other bolts on the roof, sikaflex everywhere.
No cables evident anywhere.


The Peugeot Boxers have structural loading lugs along both sides of the roof and the Thule Awning is mounted to 4 of these on the near side.  4 special brackets are bolted to the the existing awning brackets and the nearside Thule rail is attached to these along with adhesive to the roof.
The new Thule rail system will use the lugs on the offside as well as being fixed with adhesive to the roof.
There is no bolting through the roof involved.
   Bars will then be attached to the rails and my Hullivators then attached to the bars. So you can see I do know the outcome of my mod.
I'm sorry if you thought me mad ( friends do though at times ) just didn't want to bore people as have just done with a fuller explanation of my mod.
I have recently done other mods to sliding door blind cassette ( another post ) received well by some members who want to do similar but a bit long legged. 
My wife and I have just returned from A/S today having had the sliding door window replaced under warranty. While there I asked Mark about the roof rail mod and he said  a little thinners but not to much, so we will see, or just leave them there. As I said at the beginning nobody can see them from the road.
 Thank you for all your polite comments.
Regards Windy

Well Windy, cannot argue with that and actually not boring at all. I don't think anyone was doubting your ability to do the job after seeing your cassette blind caper, and I am sure the bars will be ok once fitted and good luck with that.  You sure do have some bottle to be risking your warranty, though. If it were out of warranty then a different matter. By the way don't use the thinners at any cost - even a little!! Hope you will post some photos of the finished job as well.

Thanks for the comprehensive update Windy, which now has me thinking about the advice I was given before ordering my van. That advice pretty much took a 'used van' option away from me and tied me in to buying new.

I'm fairly certain that I would have gone down the 'new' route anyway, but I don't like the idea that I may have been given duff information, or worse, deliberately misled by my dealer.

It may be that the factory fitted Fiamma system used as an upgrade option by Auto-Sleeper, has a different method of fitting to the Thule system that you're fitting.

Ken.

Hello again,

A little update on the rail removal. It has been decided that the flat aluminium pieces needed to come of so I researched into methods for removing cured Sikaflex ( I am assuming that the adhesive material is Sikaflex   ) and it seems that being a Polyurethane technology once cured then mechanical removal is the only option. This is according to Anthony Wells, Marketing Manager for Industry at Sika Limited.  So it seems members crosgor, paramedic, and kaspian have the right idea, but how not to damage the paintwork.
   Went up, but did not stand on the roof,  and did a test piece by applying a little thinners to the roof ( Used standard thinners as this evaporates quicker than premium thinners ) as suggested by Mark.   No ill effects were observed so proceeded to mask up and start gently prying along the back edge of the plate with a very thin 3inch wide filler knife, gently drawing along the edge and applying a little thinners with every other slice. Once the plate was off I carefully cut most of remaining adhesive off and then used a rag with thinners to remove the remaining residue. The thinners did seem to dissolve ( or loosen ) the last remnants. Just a little touch up required.
  So all in all, so far so good.  Sort the other side in a couple of weeks.

Cheers Windy
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Hi,

It's been a while since last post and pleased to say the mod. of fitting load bearing roof rails has been completed.   The actual fitting of the rails was the easy part and any of the members should easily be able to complete a Mod. like this.    Moving the aerial from off-side to near-side was a little bit more of a challenge with finding reliable connectors to add more cable length.  Sorting out where to place the cross bars took a time as they needed to be no further apart than 1150mm.  I placed then so that both roof lights could be opened but found that the solar charge dropped by approx. 50% because the forward bar just sat above the front edge of the solar panel.  Have now moved that bar forward of the solar panel but the rear bar now inhibits the opening of the rear kitchen roof light. This is something I will live with.

Cheers Windy

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Reason for the Mod. is as photo.[You must be registered and logged in to see this link.]