BMW roof rack and bike carrier

[SteveSteveson]

Does anyone have any experience with BMW roof racks and compatible bike carriers? My wife has band me from using my saris bones on her car for various reasons, so I am looking at getting a roof mounted bike rack so I can take my bike on holiday. We have BMW OEM roof bars, which are aero shaped and have a mounting track. I have been looking at the BMW rack, but at £105 it's a bit steep, when a Thule rack is half that.

The cheapest carriers won't fit as they are designed to clamp around square bars. Thule use a system called T-track, that uses a 24x30mm 80mm U-bolt to attach to the roof rack, but I am not sure if this fits to the BMW rack. Does anyone have any experience of this, or any alternatives?

[SwissJonese]

What BMW's are we talking about? I have a 2012 F20 BMW 1 Series with OEM Roof Bars and the Thule bike racks fit fine.

[SteveSteveson]

It's an F30. From what I can tell from BMW they only sell two roof racks, one that attaches to roof bars and one that screws in to mounts in the roof and they both have the same bars with different attachment. I would guess we have the same roof rack, or at the very least it's a standard fitting. I will give it a try.

[SwissJonese]

SteveSteveson said:

It's an F30. From what I can tell from BMW they only sell two roof racks, one that attaches to roof bars and one that screws in to mounts in the roof and they both have the same bars with different attachment. I would guess we have the same roof rack, or at the very least it's a standard fitting. I will give it a try.

Yep I have the BMW Roof Bars that screw into the roof (just pull up the little flaps). The Thule bike racks t-bolt slides into the bars no problem. In my old C350 estate I had roof rails already part of the car so I just needed to buy OEM roof bars that attached to this.

If the BMW Roof Rail gap is too big you can get larger t-bolts for thule, I needed them on the Mercedes OEM roof bars. I bought all mine 2nd hand off ebay saved a fortune and sold them on after use.

[SteveSteveson]

Ok, brilliant. I will keep that in mind if it does not fit (or blame my wife for wanting the wrong car. Apparently a WRX cost too much to run and she couldn't get in to Civic Type-R).

[lufbramatt]

Thule do a fitting kit for BMW roof bars with the bigger heads on the t-bolts

http://www.roofbox.co.uk/scripts/rbvehsel4_tab.php...

[FurryExocet]

I've got a Thule carrier on my OEM rack, which is aero. The Thule system comes with several different adapter's in the box and you choose the one that fits.

My OEM bars, are just BMW branded Thule bars

[Barchettaman]

+1 on roofbox.co.uk, they're really helpful and know their stuff. The prices are pretty keen too.

[louiebaby]

It was a while ago when I bought mine for a E39 Touring, but back then the BMW systems were re-branded Thule products. (They're not the only manufacturer to do it either.)

The BMW products weren't vastly more expensive that the Thule stuff, but the saving was enough. The rack I have for the bikes is the 561, which uses a fork mount, and you chuck the wheel in a wheel bag (not supplied, but not expensive.) I've used it for road and mountainbikes, covering many thousands of miles. They're great.

[Craikeybaby]

This thread has come at a useful time for me - I need to sort out a roof rack/bike carrier for my E87 1 series. If anyone has any of the E87 OEM/Thule bits tucked away in a garage etc I'd be happy to buy them off you.

[Kell]

Craikeybaby said:

This thread has come at a useful time for me - I need to sort out a roof rack/bike carrier for my E87 1 series. If anyone has any of the E87 OEM/Thule bits tucked away in a garage etc I'd be happy to buy them off you.

It's only the footpacks you need, everything else is interchangeable. When I got rid of our E61 and moved to an A6, I sold my footpacks for the Beemer, and bought some for the A6 - both on eBay.

[SteveSteveson]

lufbramatt said:

Thule do a fitting kit for BMW roof bars with the bigger heads on the t-bolts

http://www.roofbox.co.uk/scripts/rbvehsel4_tab.php...

Oh, ta. Very useful to make sure it all fits!

[lufbramatt]

SteveSteveson said:

lufbramatt said:

Thule do a fitting kit for BMW roof bars with the bigger heads on the t-bolts

http://www.roofbox.co.uk/scripts/rbvehsel4_tab.php...

Oh, ta. Very useful to make sure it all fits!

Did the job for me :-)

[T1berious]

Yup, as mentioned BMW is just rebranded Thule. We just got the Thule and put it on our E92

Edited by T1berious on Saturday 11th March 16:44

Edited by T1berious on Sunday 12th March 12:40

[SteveSteveson]

Re-branded and a markup for the BMW badges... Sounds like the fuel filter on my old BMW bike. £30 from the manufacturer, £30 for the Triumph branded version and £50 from BMW.

[pattyg]

I've got BMW bars and 2 BMW cycle carriers for my E90. I got mine near enough brand new for £200 all in off the bay.

They look pretty cool but and work great.

Edited by pattyg on Tuesday 14th March 20:02

[AC43]

T1berious said:

Yup, as mentioned BMW is just rebranded Thule. We just got the Thule and put it on our E92

I've got four of them on my E Class estate.

Tool all the family's bikes to Centerparcs at the weekend.

Took them to France last year. Will do so again this year - hopefully twice.

[dwpers]

So I have a 2016 340i and the BMW base rack system. I went to pickup my new bike, a 2019 Trek Roscoe 8. The BMW bike system can only do tires up to 2.5” while the Trek’s are 2.8”.

Does anyone have experience with this sort of problem? Is there anything I can do?

See: https://www.shopbmwusa.com/PRODUCT/6209/BMW-TOURIN...
https://www.shopbmwusa.com/Product/3734/BMW-BASE-S...

The Trek: https://www.trekbikes.com/us/en_US/bikes/mountain-...