As some of you may remember, I bought my VX in April of 2008 when my only anticipated passengers were myself, my girlfriend, and my dog. As luck would have it, we found out Sonya was pregnant just two months later, and ever since I've been in a battle to keep the VX practical from a family transport perspective.
Along the way I bought one of Tone's cargo boxes to allow me to keep both tools and the dog behind the back seat; I bought a Yakima Skybox 16 for rooftop storage; and after reading this thread:
The Ultimate Rear Hitch Cargo Carrier Box for VX’s
...I looked into picking up a Rola Adventurer System (part #59109) with the SwingAway feature. Not cheap, but I found a sweet sale online that offered a $100 discount + $7 shipping for a 150 lb. carrier.I installed it a week ago and have been driving around with it since. Works great, no sag to the Tone hitch at all. The carrier did bounce side-to-side a bit, so I had a towing and metal fabrication shop install the bolt you see in the last picture to tighten the mount inside the hitch box. And the light module that Tone included with the hitch didn't have the correct inputs/outputs for the box, so I had to upgrade that as well.
The swingaway option is an absolute must on this unit since the rear door is inaccessible without it. With that option in place, our door swings to the left, while the carrier swings out to the right. Couldn't ask for a more perfect system. We're heading to Wisconsin tomorrow, so I'll let you guys know how it works out on a long trip.
Check it out...
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