Buy Thule 897XT Hullavator Kayak Roof Rack Mount CarrierThule 897XT Hullavator Kayak Roof Rack Mount Carrier Product Description:
- Load and unload kayaks are waist level, at the side of the vehicle for greater convenience and safety
- Gas-assist struts lift and lower 40 pounds of kayak's weight--making it easy for one person to load
- Double extending arms lower the kayak by up to 40 inches for faster loading and unloading
- Fits Thule rack systems and round bars only
- Includes all straps to transport 1 kayak; up to 2 carriers per vehicle; limited lifetime warranty
Product Description
Kayak Carrier Accessory with lift assist - reduces lift height by up to 40" for carrying kayaks on roofracks
Customer Reviews
Most helpful customer reviews
16 of 16 people found the following review helpful.
I LOVE MY HULLAVATOR!!!!!!
By Lakotasue
For a short female doing your own loading, this system is AWESOME!!! Some call it pricey, but hey...you get what you pay for. It makes loading a kayak soooo easy! The only thing I have problems with is getting the loading arms correctly positioned on the frame. It's difficult to line up the holes so one can insert the pins that hold the arms to the frame. I'm 5'4" and have a tall car (Hyundai Santa Fe) so holding the arms up (each one weighs about 25#)and trying to align all the holes can be a little difficult. That is the ONLY drawback for me, but a taller person might not have this issue.The system comes with a video on how to load it, straps for securing the kayak to the arms and extra fore and aft tie-downs.The roof rack bars have locks, but the arms don't so I bought a couple of long cable locks for when I leave the car to kayak.Every time I use it I find myself saying out loud, "I LOVE this thing!"I would totally recommend this rack system.
32 of 36 people found the following review helpful.
Great idea needs better execution
By C. Chang
I've seen many video clips on the net introducing this product (search youTube) so I will skip the functions of it. Lifting my 17' kayak onto my CR-V roof is not something enjoyable, so I bite the bullet. I had to abandoned my factory cross bar and installed the Thule Aero Rapid bars (Thule square and Yakima round will also work but the Aero bar looks much nicer) to accommodate that. This is needed for the load bar to extend 4 to 8 inch beyond the foot, my factory bar will not do that. So after sinking in about $700 I got this going. The installation was not difficult; they even included a DVD with installation instructions. It seems the Hullavator is designed with the square bar in mind. The adaptation to the Aero bars looks like an afterthought. They gave you 4 thin plastic clear films per arm to protect the contact points. A square bar would fit nicely under the mounting bar. But for the Aero bar there were just 4 contact points; I don't even want to tighten the screws too much because of that.I know before hands that the added height to my CR-V will not clear my garage door; so keep that in mind. The shorter cradle can barely makes it; the bottom taller cradle just simply won't. Now Thule has the Hull-a-port PRO which has a cradle/carrier that will fold, you would think they could have that feature on this $440 product, right? That will sure let me drive my CR-V into my garage without taking it off. The DVD suggest that you take the whole arm assembly off when entering a low clearance garage and states that it is easy.. Ah, it was not that easy, the arms are heavy and putting and removing the pivot pins through the holes can be tricky. I think I will just take the cradles off for now.Another thing is the Aero bars are nice looking but this Hullavator is not; two big gray boxes without much aero dynamics are sitting on my car roof.. They did pack a lot of mechanisms in there so I guess there is not much room for improvements in that regard. Oh, also be careful not to hit your head, it sticks out just enough to get you. on the other hand it was a good thing that it leave more space on the rack for other things. I moved the front cross bar to in between the front and back doors to avoid it. I can see some other car may not have that choice.Enough whining I guess the benefits are exceeding the shortcommings so it is a keeper for now.
17 of 20 people found the following review helpful.These are awesome!
By Mark Diamond
I have a Toyota '08 Forerunner Limited, with two on top during the summer. They only work with a Thule Rack System; not Yakama's Rack System! Yack-a-ma has round rack bars, which is REALLY STUPID and annoying since nothing can really attach to it. I have two Pungo 140s by Wilderness Systems, which are basically two 14' kayaks, and trying to lift them onto an SUV unless you're 6'7" doesn't really work too well, especially with a static rack.The Hullavators are easy to release, you just have to clench a handle and pull them down. Put the Kayak up maybe 3' and tie it down sideways on, then you just click both of the handles at the same time and it just raises them up with the kayak, right on top. Getting them off the top is much easier, too. Two Hullavators do fit on one Thule rack system with my Kayaks loaded. That worried me for a while!The one thing that I didn't realize was that it need six locking cores eight if you're getting two Hullys. It's a pain in the A$$, big time to put it all together! But it worth it! Don't try and mount the Hullavator to a Yakima Rack System, it won't work right, the Yakima system will tilt and fall to the side. It's junk in general, I think. Thule goes ON Thule. lol! :) Trust me!Overall, it works Thule on Thule, even with two Thule Hullavators! It's definitely worth the expense if you're a fairly serious into Kayaking, have a SUV and aren't 6'7"! :)
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