940 Wagon RTT (roof top tent)

Has anyone ever installed a roof top tent on a 940? (Or 240/740 or basically anything with a gutter rails).

Do I need to reinforce the car at all? I know SmittyBilt has a reinforcing kit for the mounting location of sorts but I want to see what others have had to go through if someone?s already gone down this road.

I know you can sleep 2 adults in the back with the seats down (I?ve done it) but then the space for hauling other equipment gets lost.

The other option would be to sleep in the back but then you need a skybox or similar luggage rack option and the RTT allows for cooler air on hotter days when doing summer camping.

IIRC the top is rated to hold 200lbs, and not much more than that... so I would keep that in mind. The gutter raids are just folded up pieces of metal, so you're not getting a TON of secure support up there.


EDIT: Just check my owners manual and aye, the max roof load weight is 220lbs or 100kg.

That is good to know.. might have to go the traditional route of a mattress in the back and a sky box for the rest of the supplies on top then

Not many manufacturers break it out, but there's a 'static' load limit, and a 'dynamic' load limit. The number you normally see is the dynamic limit, how much weight can be up there while the car is moving around, bumping down roads, accelerating, cornering, braking, etc. It's going to be lower than what it can hold when sitting still (assuming you're not up there violently jumping around).

We do a lot of road tripping somewhere between overlanding and rock crawling, lol. The 4Runners are still road legal and comfortable to drive cross country, but capable enough to do difficult trails. But I really don't see the appeal of a RTT.

One small aspect is that it puts a couple of hundred pounds (not counting the rack?) way up high on the roof, and on some of the things we do that really could be the difference between flopping or proceeding.

Another is you're always having to camp on the car. A lot of the camping we do is dispersed camping out west. Where often you park near the road where it's sunny, hot, dusty, and people drive by. And you camp 10 - 50 yards into the woods, next to a stream, under the trees, where its shaded, cooler, quieter, prettier.

Another is the freaking ladders. Now a Volvo is shorter than a lifted 4Runner, but either way, if I get up in the middle of a dark night and need to take a piss, I don't want to have to fumble my way down a skinny aluminum ladder. I'm just going to bust my ass at some point.

Cost: You could go BERSERK buying the bougiest backpacking tent made, with gossamer kevlar mesh, carbon fiber poles, titanium zipper (or whatever super spendy backpacking tents are made of, lol) and you spend less than the cheapest (skipping by the Alibaba/Wish gambles) RTT's.

We just use our backpacking tent. Throw in a cheap tarp as a ground cloth when car-camping to keep it cleaner on extended trips. It really takes about 5 - 10 minutes (working slowly) to set up. It takes up practically no room in the car. You can set it up anywhere there's flat ground, not where you can park a car. It's well ventilated (some RTT's are NOT), it's not up on the roof getting rain-soaked/sun-blasted/road-dusted constantly. Toss in a couple of backpacking air pads and sleeping pads, boom, we're set up. Another quick knockdown in themorining and you're off again.

Yes I have a Thule Tepui tent on a Thule Squarebar gutter rack. No issues.

Max. roof load according to Owner's manual is 100kg, which I guess is the dynamic load limit with the static load being much higher.
The tent itself has 45kg.
I did travel on my own though, but I don't have the feeling the gutter rails are particularly overloaded with the tent and people sleeping in it.
They are a pretty thick piece of metal with not a lot of overhang.

I love it, it's the best thing I bought for camping in a while.
Travelled all the way to the North Cape with it.

The drip rails are definitely strong enough if you engineer the rack well enough for static load of ~15? Volvos stacked on one-another (staged as that ad is)?

But driving it might be a little tippy/too much for the suspension/tires & ?not advise-able??

Idk about tents or any of that bougie yuppie tourist glamping crap?

What I want is a swing-away super illegal plated XR400R dirt bike (& a mech suit/different body/coordination to go with in crippled genetically defective middle age ?) & full suspension 1500W+ super illegal E-bike carrier for a giant trailer hitch that isn?t too far behind the rear axle for weight/above the roll center or too much of an angular ?moment? above or behind the axle/tailgate with the Volvo load leveler aux rear shocks (probably have to remove the fuel tank & front tire from the dirt bike & battery & maybe tire from the electric full suspension MTB?) & make the carrier out of it mikifsry grade hard anodized aluminum alloy with inconel inserts/pieces as needed?

Some skid plates, slightly lifted on vanagon 185R14C & snub nose 140 with better / more jeep XJ angle of approach (or unibody ****boxes?) & ?73 skinny commandos with rebuildable shocks, no stupid 200 series rubber trim to hold moisture against the body and rock sliders/brush guards & over-riders woulda been nice as factory OEM of all things Vol-food unibody offerings?

Guess the 445 could be had in body on frame & 4wd variants/guise sorta like a Swedish Willys wagon of the day , but been a while since they sold those & not really en masse in the USA for easy junkyard pickings w/20+ year manufacturing/sales run for USA market like the ?67-?93 140/240?
?primitive too compared to a clean slate designed car explicitly for the American market/DOT safety first big round or that upcoming in ?68 for better lighting, dual circuit power disc brakes, charcoal can, thru-flow crankcase vent, crumple zones, fast ratio power steering if you wanted it etc etc?

?then they overdid it a little with the full on hideous barge GM / k-car looking 7/9s for full on hideous 80s thing tho I like 7/9 in a limited dose kinda way?

No 4WD 445/Duetts were ever made (that I know of, from the factory at least). You may be thinking of the Sugga? That was a full sized (in the US sense) pre-war Volvo that was used as the body on a heavy duty 4WD military truck chassis in the mid 50's.



All the Duetts (445 and 210) were body on frame though.

Must have seen converted examples like the E350s w/D60 fronts done by reputable or skilled Swedish coach builders? Definitely 445/210 duett?

The cargo bay looks totally useless like the PV sedan on that thing compared to a duett or 145 or 245 express?
?part & crush immediately?
Do better/less useless for civilian uses?

I?m not a van creeper/weirdo and won?t deal with a Van engine bay in any conventional sense or being unable to separate the ?house? from the ?vehicle? (2 different sets of complicated systems IMO?) or car in such a way that you can just leave the house & put the light truck or car on Elroy?s corner gas station mechanics lift?

?truck or Volvo sized engine bay with hood that opens generously with crumple zone is nice too (even if somewhat space, aero &/or potentially fuel inefficient in some ways)?

Not that I wanna work on it, but if I have to or have to inspect stuff on strenuous trips I want the truck (that could be a flip-forward cab-forward 1970s ford or international medium duty tho?) or Volvo-like engine bay (except a horrible 1800, screw those things and their owners!) ?

I?m with JohnMc all the way on this? (Or think I am if I?m reading right? : lol
Just get a sky box that?s easy to take off &/or trailer hitch swing away rear tote/bike rack/bike channel & call it a day with a decent tent? Still cheaper & not so tied to the car, elegant as those roof tents are?
Bite sized chunks depending on the usage, easy to deal with, camp in the woods, get up to pee etc?
Put the bike/mess/ gross stuff on the roof or in the rear or roof tote &/or sky box snd keep it out of your tent or car cabin?

I?d you want a toilet/shower & automated heater etc, get a diesel sprinter for stealth, 4x4 E350 &/or super durable cab-over pop up camper for the 3/4ton+ 4x4 truck (tho coach built dually single cab 4x4 solid axle ?78 snow fighter 4x4 1 ton fords with Camper -special wheel base/wheels right at the back are rare unless you get an ex PG&E non-smog-compliant F450/550 or ex tow truck 4x4 diesel dually with a 5 speed?)? if that?s your thing?
Costs money, truck tires etc, but still one parking space, no van/molester stigma, still use the car or 4Runner for the things it does well?

I've certainly pondered making a mini-Sugga out of my PV's rusty body before. If something ever falls off it that's important and I can't crap-MIG it back on. Just stick the body on top of some small 4WD chassis. Like a Bronco II, or a first gen solid axle 4Runner. I saw one on eBay many years ago, PV544 body perched fairly well on an IH Scout chassis.

I still kick myself for not bidding on a Sugga for sale a really long time ago on eBay. It was on the East coast somewhere (GA?), wasn't running, a wee bit rough but with some extra body parts (not easy to come by at all) and the most intriguing thing, a B36 V8 instead of the low powered flat head I6 they 'all' came with. Not sure if it was something unusual put out late in production by the factory, or a swap done afterward, but having a unicorn motor in a unicorn Volvo? Too cool!

And of course, utterly pointless.

I just want the whole 1980 IH scout II Turbodiesel traveler long wheelbase my neighbor has?
Obscure/hard to find OEM parts for, yes!
Primitive, yes!
Convertible for midlife crisis & long enough wheel base for functional highway driving/some towing & reasonably fuel efficient in 2-tone brown/orange 1970 grandpa truck, also yes?

I saw a real nicely done Bronco I replica on a Bronco II frame?
Could barely even tell it started out as the red headed step child ford compact SUV from the 80s everyone (rightly?) forgot about and even had a nice narrowed high pinion D44 HD Up front that tucked up nice with driver offset that barely cleared the EFI SBF from an F150 lightening donor at full suspension compression?

?well played/well done?
(given clean OG late model ?74-?77 Bronco-I costs ~as much as a house anymore?)
Just have to live vicariously thru a friend who has a fully loaded Bronco-Centurion 1-ton EFI 460;
for the monied ford middle America / timber guy in its day who wouldn?t have just bought a suburban 3/4 ton and called it good after they quit making the nice 1-ton option-able travel-alls in 1975?

I dream / have sicko libertarian fantasies or the dirt bike perfectly blocking the single rear license plate for CA bridge camera tolls & tickets &/or winching the empty tow dolly or trailer up onto my roof rack so I only have the usual 2 axles touching the ground (bridge tolls or speed limit laws for additional axles (even if unloaded) are completely extortionist/asinine in CA) just on principle with that POS extortionist state!

Fa182 said:

Yes I have a Thule Tepui tent on a Thule Squarebar gutter rack. No issues.

Max. roof load according to Owner's manual is 100kg, which I guess is the dynamic load limit with the static load being much higher.
The tent itself has 45kg.
I did travel on my own though, but I don't have the feeling the gutter rails are particularly overloaded with the tent and people sleeping in it.
They are a pretty thick piece of metal with not a lot of overhang.

I love it, it's the best thing I bought for camping in a while.
Travelled all the way to the North Cape with it.

Click to expand...

That looks like loads of fun, and quite the nice place to wake up, and while maybe felt the load up top dosent look the worst !

What kind of highway speeds did you do with that up there? A lot of back road driving never hurt though!

whatshouldido said:

That looks like loads of fun, and quite the nice place to wake up, and while maybe felt the load up top dosent look the worst !

What kind of highway speeds did you do with that up there? A lot of back road driving never hurt though!

Click to expand...

It was, I really enjoyed it.
The "freedom to roam" rule that is still in place in the Nordic countries by law makes it possible and really easy to just stop where you want and camp for the night as long as you don't harm nature and respect privacy rights.
So these are the ideal countries here in Europe to do something like this.

While driving I really didn't notice the tent.
When I got it, I was afraid the wind noise is going to be really loud and need to build a spoiler or something.
All that didn't happen though and I even did not use any more fuel on that trip compared to driving around without it.
However, the slower speed limits were probably the real reason for this.

Anyway, my round trip to the North Cape was around 5000 miles give or take.
When I drove highways, which was mostly the first and last couple days, I mostly did around 75mph, but occasionally 80mph if necessary.

There are no highways in Norway above Oslo or in Finland above Tampere, where I did most of my driving.
They have 50mph speed limit on normal roads, so I didn't do more than that most of the time.
That was more than enough though, I needed time to admire all of the breathtaking scenery anyway.

In parts of Europe, could totally see the appeal of the RTT atop the external drip rail Volvo wagon with lower operation costs/fits in a small carport or garage easier than a sprinter etc?

In America with the average american pig A-hole glampers, yuppies, criminals & rednecks etc. driving their coal rolling loud bro-dozers & harleys (thankfully Harley riders seem to be dying out?), loud power boats, noisy sand rails, lifted trucks to tear everything up group of 12 sharing the brain cell starting the camp fire with a giant bunch of gasoline &/or toxic refinery waste stream stinky BBQ 'lighter fluid' & stirring up the dust or having a leaf blower, I'd give being near them/the roads/car camping crowd a miss 9/10+ times & rather even wheel my tent 200+ yards away or have a roof top rocket box. rear dirt bike or hitch mounted bike rack or tote off the back etc (bonus points for swing-away so you can still use the rear hatch without having to unload everything?) etc?
Bonus for running their noisy generators & A/C/TVs etc in their giant RVs all night?


Then, there are all the ****head owner-operator local logging truck / dump truck guys that make it a point of pride to unmuffled 'machine gun' jake brake down the hills (I totally understand using the jacobs, exhaust brake or retarder to save brake pad wear & slow the truck safely on long grades, just put a nice big muffler on it like the new trucks do? No moving parts/doesn't impact economy, power or reliability?).

I assume the Venn diagram of those guys and harley **** heads is an oval at best if not a circle?
Thankfully, they're dying off, but we have yet to have some self-constructing & de-constructing robotic erector set electric rail, cable & canal infrastructure to just eliminate them/the need for all of them?


If anything, I want the 15' grumman aluminum 980lb payload sailing canoe w/electric jet drive + solar panel & e-bike that can tow it so I can empty the entire car I don't worry that much about that's fully depreciated (like the RWD or P80 Volvo or Gen 1 Subaru Legacy?) & leave said car near the ranger/camp ground lodge where it won't get vanalized or broken into hopefully & load everything into the boat & silently boat to the far quiet side of a lake island to get away from all those A-holes in the bite-sized 1-man band setup in the rapidly being invaded PNW?
Don't want to have to go far or make it a full-on backpacking excursion, but do want some peace & quiet in a tent a ways away JohnMc style, but 'the scene' is a little different than Northern Europe I'd bet?

Q: How do you know you're a redneck?
A: You go 'camping' & your standards of living actually improve!

Hard to fly like an Eagle (or be a good steward/camper?) when you're dealing with a bunch of turkeys?

We've been doing 'overlanding' glorified car-camping with some off roading of various difficulty outin Colorado and Utah each summer since 2000. And we've very rarely had any issues while doing dispersed camping in the various public lands out there. But a BIG FACTOR in that is slowly learning the good spots, and a lot about what makes a good spot is that it's up a bit of a gatekeeper section of 4WD trail. It's often PACKED with people where regular cars can easily drive around some potholes and gravel to get to.

And, FWIW, it was WAY more crowded in 2020 and 2021, my guess being COVID cancelled a lot of international travel, so a lot more people were doing domestic trips instead, and the super scenic Moab area in Utah, and Winter park/Fraser and Silverton/Ouray/Telluride in Colorado, were PACKED with tourists and the dispersed sites were JAM PACKED (with people who often trashed the place up too, why?).

And then this year? COVID bump seemed to be all over, back down to normal. Some areas have been closed in the meantime due to the actions of the 'new' swarm of trash-strewing people, maybe they'll open up again. But by and large, way fewer people 1/2? Something like that.