A couple of weeks ago, I was able to take our Scion xB to Willits, CA., to attend a family reunion. After 500 miles up, and 500 back, I can say that the little aqua box was a real surprise and a pleasure to drive. It had more power and more interior room than I expected, and with all those A/V gadgets to play with, the highway hours flew by.
Once i got to "Antler Ranch", I needed to set up camp. Now this is where the Scion showed a little versatility. I backed the xB up to a Manzanita tree, tied one end of my hammock to a branch, and the other to a line I tied between the rear passenger grab handles......Then I went over it in my head.
I'm 170lbs, so say, 85 lbs. to the tree, and 85 lbs. to the handles. Now the 85 lbs. would be divided between the two handles, then between the two mounting screws.....so something like 20 lbs. load per screw, right? I'm no engineer, but that seemed OK.
I had visions of a "2008 Scion xB: Broken Handle Replacement Cost" future blog posting, but after i hopped in, it held for three full days, with no problems.
PS - I apologize for this entry being out of sequence, but we've been slammed lately with our video coverage of the Frankfurt Auto Show . Check it out.
John Adolph, Video Production Specialist @ 6,400 miles.
I'm 170lbs, so say, 85 lbs. to the tree, and 85 lbs. to the handles. Now the 85 lbs. would be divided between the two handles, then between the two mounting screws.....so something like 20 lbs. load per screw, right? I'm no engineer, but that seemed OK.
I had visions of a "2008 Scion xB: Broken Handle Replacement Cost" future blog posting, but after i hopped in, it held for three full days, with no problems.
PS - I apologize for this entry being out of sequence, but we've been slammed lately with our video coverage of the Frankfurt Auto Show . Check it out.
John Adolph, Video Production Specialist @ 6,400 miles.
SubyTrojan says:
06:19 PM, 09/17/07
Nice post, John! Now it's time to try accomplishing the same feat with your Impreza! j/k
robert4380 says:
06:38 PM, 09/17/07
And to think that people made fun of the Pontiac Aztek with the camper package on the back end. Oh this looks like a much better solution.
texases says:
07:32 PM, 09/17/07
You are lucky - the load can be quite a bit higher than you'd think, depending on the angle of the ropes. Of course, those are grab handles, right? So they're probable good for at least 100 lbs. each.
billt9 says:
08:46 PM, 09/17/07
Look at the little dirt devil getting itself all dirty in the dirt and going on about with its big mouthed grin!
It looks like it came straight out of the Cars movie with its cartoon eyes and mouth.
opfreak says:
06:32 AM, 09/18/07
its not the static load i'd worry about. The dynamic loading would be much higher
bimmerjay says:
07:43 AM, 09/18/07
The Aztek had plenty of other reasons to be made fun of for, I'm not sure why the camper package even needed to be one of them.
jadolph says:
10:45 AM, 09/18/07
opfreak & texases - after i got back, i found a chart that says that the higher the angle (0 being straight across, 90 straight down) the load is mutiplied by 3,4, and 5 times.......gulp. god bless grab handles!
robert - way back when, i had some friends that were looking to rent an aztek for that partictular reason, but of course, no rental house would carry one with that option!
scott65 says:
12:09 PM, 09/18/07
oy that color...
desmolicious says:
01:17 PM, 09/18/07
I really like that colour. Audi had that same shadeof paint on the TT. It was either called Battleship Gray or Nimbus Gray IIRC.
rick8365 says:
07:11 PM, 09/18/07
I thought only PaperMate stick pens came in this color.....
tryan says:
03:53 AM, 09/19/07
This is what amounts to a 3 dimensional vectored load on the mounting screws - simultaneously being in tension and exposed to shear stress and a bending moment (however small). I am very impressed the handles held, it goes to show you the factors of safety that we engineers are allowed to design in when the bean counters don't get involved...or don't notice.... ;)
texases says:
10:20 AM, 09/19/07
Here's another way to think of the rope load - say you take a rope, tie one end to a tree, hold onto the other, and hang a 10 pound weight in the middle. As you move away from the tree it takes more and more 'pull' to try and straighten out the rope, and you can never pull hard enough to get it 100 percent straight.
ateixeira says:
12:25 PM, 09/19/07
The color looks like blue primer to me.
Neat idea with the hammock.
texases says:
03:53 PM, 09/19/07
Here's a better way next time - loop it over the roof and through the front two doors - you could be a sumo wrestler then, no problem!
penboy says:
12:58 PM, 09/20/07
I don't think that I would have thought to try putting that much stress on the handles, but it's good to see that they can take that sort of a beating.
As for the car, I'd have to personally say it's rather ugly in any color, but that one does make it worse. At least it's practical and reasonably affordable...
toyota_f1 says:
01:54 PM, 09/20/07
I know if I had done that I'd have slept with my head towards the tree so if the handles gave way I'd only injure my rump.