Ideal solution for easy mounting and storage The Thule 571 is well suited to install and remove our 1800 cargo box on our Volvo wagon. Just pull the car in the garage under the box crank the box down to the load bars slide the rope off the ends of the box and tighten the box clamps to the load bars. One person can do the whole thing in a few minutes. Plus it's a great way to get the box up and out of the way when it's not in use.The mounting and installation directions leave a fair bit to creative interpretation. Our garage is open joists so I cut short sections of 2x4s to mount between the joists enabling me to anchor the pulleys and other support hardware where it needed to go. Plan on a few hours to get the whole thing mounted. But once it's up it's terrific. There's sufficient tension in the crank to hold an empty cargo box in place once you've cranked it to the desired position.Our package arrived with one essential part missing. The customer service folks at Thule happily sent me what I needed in the mail. It took a few phone calls to keep the nocharge order in the pipeline but after a few weeks I got what I needed.
If you build a frame it'll work fine Installed this system on a 2x4 'H' frame I built lag bolted to our 10 ft garage ceiling and it works fine. Our car top box now has a very practical storage resting above the garage door as it's opened by 5 or 6 inches Now we can easily mount our ski box just when we need it and use the drivethru car wash too.
Indispensable with a few annoying gliches This is an excellent way of storing a rooftop box. I have it mounted directly above the car in the garage so that even my wife can install a fullsize thule box on her own with no help. I actually keep the crossbars on the box to save time in installing and removing the box. It takes no useful space in the garage.The only annoyance are the lines which do not wind onto their reels uniformly causing the box to tilt as it is lifted. The way to avoid it is to lift the box very slowly and back up when you see the lines starting to overlap.
Works Good With Modifications and Additions Out of the box forget it. The screws provided are for concrete if using rafters buy 1/4 lag bolts and washers. I choose to build a 2x4 wood frame the proper size for the storaged unit. Putting 1/4 Hook screws into the rafters and eye bolts and Shooks on the frame they were connected with heavy chain. I mounted the hardware for the lift unit on the bottom of the frame. I read a complaint in the reviews about having to turn the hand crank to many turns. A 1/4 shackle and pin on a 1/2 x 36' Aluminum Rod and a 1/2 variable speed drill did the job just watch the speed. The rope was about 12 feet short of the loop reaching the floor so I added 12 feet of 1/4 rope the square knot went through the wheels OK.
Thule Lift Does the job for my Thule Atlantis 1600 Cargo Carrier Some Hints1 Instructions are abit light and in mm so convert to inches first then draw your installation design and measure on garage ceiling before beginning. Locate the studs. Remember they should be 16in on center look for the dimples. After you cut your wood dry fit everything on the ground to make sure it will work. This will save you alot of pain if you are a NOVICE. Mark everything and GO!!2 The kit comes with MASONARY screws so go buy WOOD screws both Phillips for pulleys and Flathead WOOD screws for the brackets.3 Get 2X4s or 1X4s to mount your hardware to. If you cut three spans at 52in and mount them with a 2in overhang and the 16in on center e.g. 16 32 and 48in intervals on the studs in your garage ceiling with screws you will have a strong brace for your pulleys and crank. I spaced my pulleys 37in by 37in for the 1600 and it worked great with a 12 ft garage height.4 Get two water pipe insulators 3/8in with selfadhesive strip pulltape and use it as cushion for the object you are storing. Goes right over the rope and it will reduces the friction and stress on the rope about $2.50 at Home Depot.
Great product but read the reviews for installation instructions I bought this recently to store our new Thule 1800 box. I installed it in a garage with drywall ceilings over 10 feet high. I used three fourfoot 2x4's to mount the pulleys and hoist mechanism. As recommended I used wood screws all around. Due to the beam spacing in the garage I mounted the pulleys with a spacing of 32. This was less than the recommended half of the length of the product to be stored. The rope turned out perfectly centered over the mounting points of the box with the rope going between the hooks that grab onto the roof rails. The box is not going anywhere .I installed the pulleys and hoist mechanism on the 2x4 sections before mounting the 2x4's to the ceiling. This made it much simpler than installing all the hardware on the ceiling. It was preceded by a lot of stud finding plan drawing and measuring but the results were perfect.I also followed a reviewer's suggestion of enclosing the load bearing portion of the rope with foam pipe insulation. That will definitely protect the rope from fraying and actually looks quite good.I have no reason not to rate this product 5 stars.
Not just for garages I don't have a garage. And I was tired of lugging my Atlantis 1600 up and down the stairs to and from the basement. Unlike other storage systems that require mounting to a flat ceiling the design of the Thule Box Lift allowed me to install it in the peak of my 8ft x 8ft shed. My cargo box now tucks up nicely into the peak of the shed. The bottom of the cargo box is essentially flush with the top of the shed door/walls so I can still access all areas of the shed. It took a little more work and thought but well worth it in the end. See the customer images section for pictures of my installation.
Does the job but could use improvement I bought the Thule 571 to store our Yakima 21 Skybox over the garage door. Installation wasn't difficult and I found the instructions adequate. A few issues though the supplied rope is not that long and I later figure out there is a reason for that. I have 10 foot ceilings and fully extended leaves the box about 5' from the ground. After replacing the rope with a longer one I found that the ropes overlap each other while spooling up on the bar at different rates and this causes the box to rise unevenly. In addition winding takes a long time when pulling the box up 10' since the windup bar is so thin.I made a slight modification to the lift to improve it a bit. I slid a 1/2 inch PVC pipe over the bar that winds up the rope and a 3/4 inch PVC pipe over the 1/2 inch pipe. This allows the rope to wind up over the larger pipe and causes the box to rise faster for each turn and just about eliminates the overlapping of the rope. I added a picture in the additional images section.Overall it's a good product but it could be better and it should be cheaper. The only reason they can charge this much for it is because there are other products out there like it.
OK but leaves a lot to be desired The product does what it says it does. ButThis is a Thule product not a cheap knockoff. This would suggest that it is a quality piece of equipment and that the instuctions are clear and easy to follow. Unfortunately that is not the case. The product is obviously designed with the European market in mind the English language instructions are markes as GB and all measurments are in metric which itself is no big deal but confirms that Thule is not understand its customers. European garages must be much smaller than garages in the US or Canada. Ours has a 10ft high ceiling. Forget it! The rope that is included in the package is so short that at its lowest setting the cargo box hangs a good 20 inches above the vehicle. Frankly rather than a nylon rope the product should be suspended by straps which would be more stable. And more importantly because of the ceiling height the crank shaft supplied is way too short.
Ceiling mount storage lift The ceiling storage lift works well. Went up easily because I have a wood ceiling in my garage. I use it for a 2 man fish house. I can back right under it with my truck and just lower it into the box of the truck. It takes a lot of hand cranking. The rope that comes with it isn't long enough for a 10' ceiling so I had to purchase more rope. Most garages being built now days have 9'6 to 10' ceilings so for the money this cost I would think they could send enough rope. Simple design but works great. People with sheetrock ceilings will need to put a board on the ceiling under the pullys.
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