Can someone explain to me why anyone would buy an after market roof rack. The Mini Base model can be had for under 200 and holds twice as much weight than the Yakima or Thule which both cost almost twice the price.

The Mini Fork mount bike carrier includes locks and is also less than the Thule..

Am I missing something here,,, splain it to me Lucy...

 

Thule & Yakima kits (majority) are not car specific & comes with fairings whereas OEM MINI load bars are. OEM load bars have a cleaner look BUT the bars are quite thicker resulting more wind noise … plus it decreases mpgs.

So if one would decide to move on he or she can still use the aftermarket roof system and that also applies on roof baskets. Thule used to make a very similar to the OEM roof basket but has been discontinued long time ago.

 

Surely they only come with fairings if you order them that way. Would it not make more sense then to buy a Mini rack and add a fairing.. would still be tons cheaper and able to carry almost double the weight. How much MPG difference would it really make.. that could only come into effect at higher speeds.. I think you would have to be doing a lot of mileage for it to make any significant difference to yr gas costs. And BTW The Thule and the Yakima would have about the same drag effect too..

 

OEM MINI load bars do not with fairings… one should either custom build one or get an aftermarket accessory. Upon installation, it would need to be angled correctly in order to decrease the wind drag.

OEM MINI load bars, like said before, dropped my mpgs from 37.X to 32.X - pretty significant that anyone would agree and that is I do not have anything loaded on the car and no fairing installed.

About the weight, I believe that the aftermarket will compensate against its weight because of the decrease on wind drag.

Both Thule & Yakima come with the updated Areo bars a lot better than the MINI load bars.