SUVs, CUVs, they are everywhere. Seems like well they are like elbows, every driveways got a couple of them. But the big thing is SUV or CUV, the U stands for utility. Now that’s a good thing but one of the things that make them utilitarian is that they might have a roof rack on them. Because often you have to carry things on the roof of the vehicle.

Now, you look at all of these vehicles, you look at them new, one of the things that you want to ask is, does that roof rack come with the crossbars? Because the majority of them, well the rails are there but you don’t have any crossbars and you can’t put anything on the roof. You have to buy the crossbars as an accessory and it is optional. So, you know, ask questions, find out.

Now a lot of them, well you will find, like this car, it does have the crossbars on them and you can put the various attachments and everything on there for whatever you might want to carry. And one thing to remember about any of these, once you start putting things on the roof, remember that there is a weight limit as far as how much weight you can put up there safely.

Alright now, the other thing is, if you’re planning on that, even sedans, some of them, and cars like this Kia Soul, they have these black strips that run down the length of the roof. Now the thing you want to do there, is you want to look to see if you have something like this little black plastic cap or a little hinged thing that looks like this that you can lift up. Because that means that you can add a roof rack to that vehicle. Now, the majority of them, what you do is you take this and you pull this out and there’s going to be an adapter with the roof rack that you purchase and there will be a screw septical down in there, it usually comes with a tool to install it. You tighten it down in there and you have yourself a roof rack on a car that didn’t come from the factory with it.

So if you want to use a car like that, then by all means, do your research before you buy the car. And if you have a question or comment, drop me a line right here at MotorWeek.