Newbie from the Isle of Wight

Mattm117camper · Sep 7, 2023

Hi All,

First time VW camper here, I'm picking up a 2020 Coast on Saturday and very excited about it.

I intend to purchase the Thule Hullavator for a sea kayak as I prefer it to the kari tech rack. From reading the various threads it seems I need the Thule evo pro bar + 753 mount + 7057 kit.

Is there anyone using this setup already who can confirm it's correct? I think I've read so much I'm starting to doubt myself.

Looking forward to this learning journey with you all.

Hawthorn37 · Sep 14, 2023

Welcome to the forum. No idea about kayak carriers sorry - son used to just strap his onto to the roof of his Peugeot 207 ! Just wanted to say hi though.

owen_h · Sep 14, 2023

The Hulivator on Thule foot packs and bars will still be quite high to lift the kayak onto. If you don’t like the KariTek because of its ‘industrial’ appearance then look at the Kombi Rak instead. Very similar principle but much smoother operation and looks. I gave a friend in the club (NFKCC) a lift a few weeks ago and he put his KariTek up for sale a few days later in order to swap to a Kombi Rak
I’ll post some pics tomorrow if interested. I’m in Winchester if you wanted to see the rack for real.
Oh and welcome as well

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

owen_h · Sep 15, 2023

Few images of the Kombi Rak with my sea kayak on it. There are 2 side loading positions and in the pics it shows the higher version for a boat on the lefthand/nearside.
(unlike the KariTek) the aero dropdown section slides around the fixed square section on roller bearings leaving just a low profile aero bar. (noticeably better mpg).
In my photos with the kayak the cradles are a home-brew affair I used until I got the one shown in pic 3 from KCS.
The Kombi Rak was developed, manufactured and sold to me by @Johnboy on this forum.

Johnboy · Sep 16, 2023

Qwen,
thanks for the kind words and great photos of Kombi-rak.

Mattm..... I have had customers sell their hullavators and buy the Kombi-rak instead. The reasons as far as I can gather are as follows...

You need a roofrack already to fit the hullavator to
It only carries 1 kayak
It weighs a lot - ref lifting poptop
Non aerodynamic
It is "lift assist" but I was told this didn't work well for large kayaks - and the one I saw rattled a lot.

Kombi-rak is none of the above and can be used for many things such as top-boxes, canoes and general loading. The price is about the same as the hullavator.

You can contact me at info@vixxos.com

John