DIY truckbed extender

[PigPen]

During our last meet n' greet my truck bed extender for hauling my tunnel hulled kayak was mentioned and I though the the communitty might benefit from some pictures and my lessons learned on trying to haul a kayak with a unique hull shape. When I was trying to figure out which kayak to buy I looked at lots of reviews, websites, sales docs and other angler's experience and narrowed it down to a Mariner, Commnader, Pro Angler, and Jackson Cusa. After consider weight, cost and propulsion I (Chris Parson in Wild Wood NJ helped a bunch) I fell in love with the Mariner. All of the kayaks have some sort of tunnel hull which makes them amazingly stable but hard to image them being loaded into a traditional rack. Since I'm too cheap for a yakima rack anyway I decided to build one.

I wanted a cheap durable material (;pressure treated lumber, galvinazed screws, and Malone Auto Racks MPG168 foam pads. I used 1/2" thick oak finshed in a heavy out dor urathane to hold the foam to the saddles. I set the length to maximize my 72: truck bed and still leave room for some storage, but required me to get up over the wheel wells making loading slightly harder. I made the length such that the kayak is supported at teh 4' and 8' point to spread out the weight. The tailgate supports the extender but otherwise is reasonably rigid. I added a small deck to add a stoarage box above the other wheel well.

I initailly tried to replicate the 'J' style racks but after trying to enter a parking garage with them in (lots of fun) I decided that there needed to be another way and the tunnel hulled kayaks are really designed to put much weight on their side causing it to warp in the heat (MD in June go figure).

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[CAGE RATTLER]

Thanks for the pics and post.

Im working on a DIY rack for my 08 F150 to haul multiple kayaks a little higher than the bed rails where i can store the gear in the bed with the tail gate closed and the toneau cover closed. Its simple enough to toss my outback in the bed and strap it down and put my gear in the back seat (extended cab) of my truck but with 2 or more it gets crowded. And i dont want to go up over the cab either. i cant imagine lifting the outback up that high. My truck has a slight lift and oversize tires too.

[PigPen]

It occured to me that a challange to my design is the pads and how I attached them. When pushing a kayak up and over them they tried to twist off and sometimes did so I had to wrap them up in gorilla tape to keep them still ..