Sherpa Equipment Company - 5th Gen

[sn_85]

I've spent some time this week trying to highlight some problem areas in the instructions. You guys have provided a ton of advice in regards to the Crestone install and we can't thank you enough. It is sounding like there are some small problem areas that needed just a little more clarification. I would love to hear your thoughts on the updates being that you have all installed a rack system and understand the process.

https://static1.squarespace.com/static/5963ec2d8419c2ccfec56eac/t/5f29803ae339694cd07e6189/1596555331909/Crestone_Instructions+v5.pdf

We are also looking at expanding our line up of install videos once we are located in our new shop.

I don't have a rack yet but will be looking to get the Crestone during your next sale. Those instructions look well done and professional. Looks like an install manual the big box players like Yakima, Thule, ARB, Rhino Rack would produce. Great work.

 

[Pendoggo4R]

I have a very odd 10 month update.

So far the Crestone has been functionally fantastic. I have no complaints about the roof rack as a system and the aesthetic wear and tear thus far (which has been great by the way).

I don't know if anyone else has run into this issue with the black hardware (which I have on my white 4R), but when it rains the streaks that come down the sides of my car from the bolt points on the crossbars leave discoloration on my paint.

After it rains it just looks like dirt / soot streaks down the sides of my car, perfectly lined up with the bolts. They usually come off when I wipe the car down.

There was a week here a month or two ago where it rained for like 9 days in a row, so I waited til it stopped raining to clean the car. This time, I couldn't get rid of the discoloration.

I'll take pictures of it and upload it tomorrow. I'm not sure what might have caused it. I did a little bit of googling and it could be the black oxide coating wearing off, but the fact that I can't get it off my paint is a bit annoying.

I suppose it's less of an issue with cars with darker paint.

 

[GripT4R]

Can i buy everything for the 5th gen except any 47” long cross bars?

I just want the side plates, mounting brackets, and full height wind deflector.

 

[JoshDub]

I just placed an order for a rack. Super excited for it. It's going to be a long wait!

 

[Pendoggo4R]

I have a very odd 10 month update.

So far the Crestone has been functionally fantastic. I have no complaints about the roof rack as a system and the aesthetic wear and tear thus far (which has been great by the way).

I don't know if anyone else has run into this issue with the black hardware (which I have on my white 4R), but when it rains the streaks that come down the sides of my car from the bolt points on the crossbars leave discoloration on my paint.

After it rains it just looks like dirt / soot streaks down the sides of my car, perfectly lined up with the bolts. They usually come off when I wipe the car down.

There was a week here a month or two ago where it rained for like 9 days in a row, so I waited til it stopped raining to clean the car. This time, I couldn't get rid of the discoloration.

I'll take pictures of it and upload it tomorrow. I'm not sure what might have caused it. I did a little bit of googling and it could be the black oxide coating wearing off, but the fact that I can't get it off my paint is a bit annoying.

I suppose it's less of an issue with cars with darker paint.

 

[JoshDub]

Looks like the hardware to me. Maybe I'll change my order from the black hardware back to the stainless ones.

 

[rageandlove]

Wow. That's not awesome. Took a look at mine and nothing permanent, but the rain here has been minimal since I put my rack on.

Some quick math says it's a $12.50 set of new bolts and washers (50 at a quarter a piece), but you need some nuts too (which aren't listed on their website) and then there is the few dozen black bolts I bought to mount stuff on the top ...

Have you tried buffing the paint?

 

[Pendoggo4R]

Wow. That's not awesome. Took a look at mine and nothing permanent, but the rain here has been minimal since I put my rack on.

Some quick math says it's a $12.50 set of new bolts and washers (50 at a quarter a piece), but you need some nuts too (which aren't listed on their website) and then there is the few dozen black bolts I bought to mount stuff on the top ...

Have you tried buffing the paint?

I have not, just normal hand washing. I'll try to give it a go when I have some time to go over to a friend's to use his orbital and see if it does anything. Given how somewhat aggressively I tried to wash it out, I'd be surprised if it goes away but who knows.

I am not an expert or experienced or have any sort of knowledge of paint or how deep auto paint can get stained with/by something or whatever, so I'm not gonna pretend like I know why this is happening. I'm also not gonna pretend like I know anything beyond what a few google searches of what black oxide stainless steel can do if the finish starts to wear.

I do think that this may be a good reason to steer towards stainless hardware though.

For what it's worth, I bought the black hardware right around when they first became available. Not sure if anything has changed since then.

 

[Pendoggo4R]

I don't mean for this to seem like I'm piling on, but I read a few posts back that a few owners were concerned about the bolts being tightened so that the washers were concave and how it affected the rubber feet. I'd never bothered to check this on my car so I took a look today.

It looks like I'll need replacements for mine. I didn't want to post all of the feet since it'd be redundant, but they all look like this.

So beware of overtightening those bolts.

I will note some things though:
- I haven't reached out to Sherpa for either the stains originating from the black hardware or these rubber feet deteriorating due to overtightening bolts, which was not specified in the installation guide. I intend to contact Sherpa, but this is to say that from other people's feedback on this thread and also from my interaction with Sherpa when I purchased my rack, their customer service is top notch and I don't expect anything less when I reach out to them.

- The deteriorating rubber feet have not caused any issues thus far with the side rails making contact with the car. When I took my RTT off of my car (due to the truck not fitting in the garage at work and no oversized parking available), I did notice that the weight of the RTT brought the side rail really close to contact, but there is no visible damage. Do keep in mind that I bought my rack a little over 10 months ago and my car has seen some shit weather.

- I want to reiterate, I am not complaining about Sherpa or the rack itself. Just providing feedback and some caution on issues I've noticed with my rack over 10 months of usage. I'm thinking I'm going to need to swap out the black hardware with stainless, and hoping that replacement rubber feet and the new bonded washers being tightened to flat instead of concave will prevent deterioration in the future.

Cheers.

 

[rageandlove]

Thanks for posting, [MENTION=427012]Pendoggo4R[/MENTION]. Two observations.

1) You have different black bolts than I received - mine are allen-style and rounded, not hex. You can see a few posts up. Not sure if that matters - mine were shipped around July 1.

I'm thinking I'm going to ask them for a set of stainless steel too and replace. While the black is a bit less noticeable, I'd rather not have to worry about problems at some point.

2) Looks like you really cranked those down - from the picture looks like the aluminum foot is bow-shaped. Here's mine by comparison:

Note, I stopped tightening the bolts the second they started to flatten (they are a little convex still) and there wasn't a lot of resistance at that point, but the rack is super solid.

So you might check if you can get the feet flat again before re-installing.

Let us know what they say about things.

 

[Pendoggo4R]

Two observations...

Thanks for replying. I took a look a few posts back and our hardware is definitely different. I suppose there is a chance that the coating on your hardware (which I presume is newer) might be better than the batch that I got, which was their first run of black hardware, but I think I would also rather not have to deal with issues down the line and just go with stainless.

I did crank down on the bolts haha. It's a heavy ass roof rack and there were no torque specs on the installation guide, so I wanted to make sure it stayed bolted down.

I'll let you know how it goes with Sherpa.

 

[Pendoggo4R]

I reached out to Sherpa a couple of days ago and had a pleasant conversation with Hayden(?) I believe it was. They said they would reach back out to me after taking a look at my posts here.

 

[rageandlove]

I reached out to Sherpa a couple of days ago and had a pleasant conversation with Hayden(?) I believe it was. They said they would reach back out to me after taking a look at my posts here.

Cool, thanks for the update. Did you suggest the put the "silver" hardware kit up for sale right next to the bonded washers? Let us know the outcome.

 

[Pendoggo4R]

Hayden from Sherpa followed up after taking a look at the few posts I made here and offered to send out new hardware and new feet at no cost. I offered to pay for at least the shipping, but he noped me immediately and sent it out. I received the hardware today.

When I was looking for a roof rack I narrowed down my options to Victory 4x4, Gobi and Rocky Mountain Racks (now known as Sherpa). Even though RMR wasn't as established as some of the other vendors, I went with them due to the no drilling design and their wait time being considerably less.

And I'm glad I did.

I always worry with new/unknown vendors what the downstream support will look like. This isn't to say anything negative about any of the competing roof rack vendors as I have no experience with them, but Sherpa has won a customer for life. If there is an option I'm looking for and Sherpa vends it, I will be going through them. Cheers!

 

[SherpaEquipmentCo]

Hayden from Sherpa followed up after taking a look at the few posts I made here and offered to send out new hardware and new feet at no cost. I offered to pay for at least the shipping, but he noped me immediately and sent it out. I received the hardware today.

When I was looking for a roof rack I narrowed down my options to Victory 4x4, Gobi and Rocky Mountain Racks (now known as Sherpa). Even though RMR wasn't as established as some of the other vendors, I went with them due to the no drilling design and their wait time being considerably less.

And I'm glad I did.

I always worry with new/unknown vendors what the downstream support will look like. This isn't to say anything negative about any of the competing roof rack vendors as I have no experience with them, but Sherpa has won a customer for life. If there is an option I'm looking for and Sherpa vends it, I will be going through them. Cheers!

Thank you for the kind words, we really appreciate it! Glad we could get you all sorted out.

 

[SherpaEquipmentCo]

Black Oxide Hardware

Just as a little update for everyone on this. From what we can tell this seems to be an isolated issue as far as vehicle paint discoloration. It is common for there to be some residue left behind on the rack side plate when water drips down the coated bolts. It is unfortunately something that is unavoidable to some extent, but we have never had anything permanent come from this. If you use stainless bolts you get the residue and if you use steel/zinc you will end up with rust.

We have switched suppliers a couple of times. The new socket head bolts do seem to have a better coating but it takes years to know how they hold up to the elements. We can always make a plan to add a stainless hardware package to the website if that is something the community wants.


Mounts and Rubber Spacers

I figured it would be best to post some more photos and videos for everyone looking at the proper way to tighten our mounts, both in the front and the rear-- see below. It is important to get this right because if you keep tightening the bolts the rubber will just push out and wrap around the mount as seen in the photos above. If you over tighten these mounts you will get cracking and you will bring your rack sides too close to the paint. We have always stated in the instructions to not go past flat on bonded washers, but now there is a lot more detail in the instructions about this. We can’t thank you all enough for the open dialog on how to improve things like this.

Once we are all settled in with the new shop, we will be working on a line of install videos for all of the rack systems. We believe this is the best way to demonstrate proper install techniques and pass along some of the tricks we use here in house.

It is also a good time to mention that all mounts and components across our entire line up of racks will be labeled for easier install.

As always, please reach out if you have any questions!


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[rageandlove]

"We can always make a plan to add a stainless hardware package to the website if that is something the community wants."

I'm interested ... I'll contact you via your website.

 

[rageandlove]

I had my 4Runner detailed this weekend (to buff out all the pinstripes trees and bushes have put in the vehicle over the last 12 months), and that lead me to come up with an alternate explanation, *especially* since there is one drip line, not one from each bolt.

I went on a week-long overlanding trip in July, around Hell's Canyon (Idaho). SUPER dusty. Dust got in everything.

Since that time, I've taken my truck to the power-wash place to try and blast all the dust lose and hand washed it at least 4 times. In addition, it's rained here a few times recently. Every time, despite 5 washings, some dust continues to come out of some part of the car - lights, little drain holes at bottom of hatch, etc.

OK, so the thing gets detailed Friday. It looks absolutely beautiful. Better than new, completely dry, etc. I drive home and park it in front of my place which has a slight (10%) lean to the passenger side.

The next day I come out and water that was trapped in the cross-bars after the detail people washed it (which always happens when it rains/car is washed) has dripped down one side of the car (the direction it was leaning) and dried off over night. And there's still dust coming out ... so the end result was that there were nice streaks of dust down the side of my car, just like [MENTION=427012]Pendoggo4R[/MENTION]'s pictures. Just replace the black/grey with brownish dust.

So [MENTION=427012]Pendoggo4R[/MENTION] I wonder if what is really going on is something else environmental ended up building up in the crossbars that was not paint-friendly and the rain just washed it out onto your paint.

 

[FourT6and2]

Nice looking rack and related products. I'm glad there are options in the market. A concern I have, though, is this:

Because all the mounting points to the roof are rubber, and the rubber will compress with more and more weight added to the rack, the rack will get closer and closer to the roof as you add gear, right? And that also means that you now have the rubber mounting feet compressed, which means the rack is looser against the roof. Won't the rack move around then? Does this make sense?

You torque down the mounting feet with an unweighted rack but then you add 200lbs and suddenly the rubber is compressed by some amount and the roof mounting bolts are no longer torqued against anything...

You can see in that video posted above of torque the rubber mounts down that after all said and done, you can wiggle the mounting feet with your hand. So will the entire rack move around a bit with weight?

 

[SherpaEquipmentCo]

Nice looking rack and related products. I'm glad there are options in the market. A concern I have, though, is this:

Because all the mounting points to the roof are rubber, and the rubber will compress with more and more weight added to the rack, the rack will get closer and closer to the roof as you add gear, right? And that also means that you now have the rubber mounting feet compressed, which means the rack is looser against the roof. Won't the rack move around then? Does this make sense?

You torque down the mounting feet with an unweighted rack but then you add 200lbs and suddenly the rubber is compressed by some amount and the roof mounting bolts are no longer torqued against anything...

You can see in that video posted above of torque the rubber mounts down that after all said and done, you can wiggle the mounting feet with your hand. So will the entire rack move around a bit with weight?

We actually have a aluminum spacer inside the rubber. So, inside our seal is no different than any other rack on the market. This what most rack companies on the market uses to keep the foot up off the roof and what most tell you to glob silicone all around to keep your roof from leaking. In our design, the rubber is not what supports your load, but what creates the seal on your roof.

The problem with over tightening the feet is the metal on the roof is thin, and when you take a big wrench with leverage, you turn that spacer into a punch, you can easily keep tightening that bolt and pushing the spacer through your roof until it bottoms out on the nut inside the roof. The rack does not need to be as tight as say your lug nuts, the hardware isn't made for it, the factory nuts in the roof are not made for it and the metal on your roof is not made for it. But, once all 4 points are snug, rubber is compressed down a bit, you have a fully sealed roof, plenty strong rack system, and hassle free no mess install.

Hoping to just shed some light on the design, and clear up any confusion on the subject. I appreciate the question as well, lets us explain our thinking and how the system works.