Hey folks,

im planning to weld a roof rack on my own so im thinking about the maximum load the roof of my 97' eco could handle?

the rack it self has a planned weight of 54kg, so i guess its a little heavy

 

On my old E-350, I installed 4 heavy duty cross bar racks. Each one was positioned directly above the wall studs ( or body ribs) and had 8" triangular gussets distribute weight in the rain gutters. Used all Grade 8 hardware. We needed a-lot of 1 1/2" steel pipe on a jobsite and nobody could deliver it until the next week. I had them set about 1800 lbs. of pipe on the rack with the fork lift. So maybe @ a ton, including the rack. No problem at all for the body but the handling scores a perfect 10 on the pucker scale! Cheers!

 

I had a roof rack on my last van with 3/4" ply on it
we lifted 500-600 lbs. motorcycles on the roof to do burn outs on it
never had an issues with the van

 

wow. so it seems to be stabil^^

 

I have Kargo Master PRO II roof rack on my 2000 E-150, they advertise the rack to be 1700 lb load capacity:
Heavy Duty Pro II Van Cargo Rack | Kargo Master

In the Installation Instructions they worn about not to exceed GVWR, locate load as low as possible and center it, danger of roll-over and such; but 1700# is impressive nevertheless. The rack itself is about 200 lb, and removal/ install is a chore.

 

impressive