If you need to haul something light and relatively flat (such as a
boxed piece of unassembled furniture, an inflatable inner tube, or
a flea-market coffee table) and you're traveling a short distance,
you don't need a roof rack. Tying gear down with two easy,
surefire knots will mount it securely and safely and take less
than five minutes.
WHAT YOU'LL NEED: A blanket (or a scrap of nonslip carpet liner)
to protect the roof, and two 20-foot lengths of 1/4-inch nylon
rope.
HOW TO DO IT:
1. Fold the blanket so it's roughly the same size as the surface
that will be in contact with the roof. Center the blanket on the
roof, then gently place the object on top of it, heaviest side
down (for example, if it's a table, put it surface-side down, legs
up).
2. Open all four doors and lay both ropes across the object — one
rope should be near the front doors, the other near the rear
doors. Tie a bowline at one end of each of the ropes. Run the
other ends of the ropes inside the car.
3. Run the unknotted end of the rope through the loop of the
bowline and then shift the entire length of rope so that the
bowline is on top of the car (that way you'll have a good angle to
cinch the rope tight). Pull down on the unknotted end of the rope.
(The loop of the bowline acts like a pulley, which will allow you
to add ample tension.) Tug until the rope is as taut as possible.
4. To tie it off, make two half hitches below the bowline.
Finally, close all four doors. If there's rope left over, make
sure it's closed inside the car. Dangling rope can whip around
until the knots loosen, or even get tangled in the tires and
break.
WORDS OF CAUTION:
Whenever you're tying something to the roof of
your car, you have to be careful — especially when you're not using
a roof rack. "You have to rely on common sense," says Tim Hurd,
spokesman for the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration.
"It's your responsibility to make sure the load doesn't shift or
block visibility." That means no precarious pyramids of lumber and
definitely nothing that needs to be held by hand. "It's not
against the law to haul things on your roof, but it is against the
law to drive recklessly," says Hurd.
