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Extra Carrying Capacity For Fortuner


SantiSuk

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With all 7/8 seats occupied by my extended family there is not much room left for even weekend luggage. Many of them are under 11 years old so there's still plenty of oomph left to pull a load.

Has anyone solved this problem? I can't find a web-site selling roof boxes specifically for this model and you just don't see small trailers around in Thailand so I assume there is some legal problem with them?

Yeah yeah I know - should have bought a Commuterbus!

Edited by SantiSuk
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I'd suggest a roof box - easy to fit/remove, holds lots of luggage, is better on fuel/performance than a trailer, and gives you way more parking options (just not undercover). Thule is arguably the most recognized brand:

http://www.thulethai.com/

Lots of knock-offs of these around for 30-50% cheaper too.

seconded

a Fortuner 4x4 has sufficient traction to carry 150 kg on the roof at speeds not exceeding 150kmh

Thule is like welded to the roof rails while some copies fly off very easily;)

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buy a pajero to pull your fortuner around

I had a similar dream but the Pajaro left it's chassis behind with the Fortuner. Rust problem you know. :lol:

hehehe :D

There's a lot more to that story than what's been revealed here.. The truth is what happened to that car would happen to any car, given the same circumstances.

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Postscript

Posted today on the contact us section of Thule website

Desperate to spend a thousand plus US dollars on a Thule roofbox here in Thailand. But your products are too difficult to access.

I decided to wait until I came to Bangkok as I expected that dealers here would be easy to access and maybe you even had a main company location. I thought I had identified the latter - something called the Concept Store in soi 25 Bangna Trat Bangkok. So I drove to the location indicated on the map and it was just an office park - no sign of Thule.

No matter - I went into the adjoining shopping mall and re-looked at the Thule website. This time I went into the worldwide site and selected Thailand. I noticed a helpful search engine that would match the range of products for specific vehicles. That's useful I thought - but alas, Toyota is there of course for the vehicle make, but there was no option for Fortuner (it's only Thailand's top-selling SUV). Not put off I selected Land Cruiser knowing this to be a very similar model but not offered in Thailand (so I don't know why it is available in the Thule search engine for Thailand). I was dismayed to see that no roofbox product is deemed to match Land Cruiser. How odd.

By now a little disheartened, still desperately wanting what many websites (even in Thailand) seem to reckon is a great product, I thought I would try one or two of the dealers indicated on the helpful little map engine, so I set my base as the Central World shopping centre, where I still was, and took details of the two nearest. The first of the two dealers had a telephone that was unanswered. Great - at least dealer two answered (my Thai wife made the calls so that English was not an issue). He was helpful and said he would check stock. He rang back and said he had a Pacific 200 and could fit same. He neglected to mention that the address, to which we then drove, had little to do with Thule business and that what he really meant was that if we ordered something (which we could not see in advance of paying - 'nobody keeps stock because they are too expensive') he would eventually get it and come to fit it at our choice of location.

I give up. You are just too bloody difficult to deal with. From comments made by a main Bangkok Toyota dealer (who we also tried on this day of frustration) Thule is regarded as too expensive by Thais and therefore the dealers will not list it.

That means you are probably dependent on foreigners in Thailand for the bulk of your business. Luckily there are a great many and some even reckon the best part of a million residing here, many of whom are reasonably well heeled and like their motors. Maybe therefore you need to address how to communicate your product offering in English here.

Just a suggestion.

If your Chief Executive is feeling good about business for Thule generally I suggest you show him this note to keep his feet on the ground. Much scope for improvement I would say!

I should also have ribbed them about their whinging about pirated copies some years back. At least those were probably easy to get.

Edited by SantiSuk
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Many thanks for the feedback TV. Very useful

Apparently not :(

hopefully these links will get you more joy:

http://www.pajerospo...hp?topic=5063.0

http://www.pajerospo...hp?topic=2268.0

Thanks to MoonRiverOasis for his continued responses.

I persevered and yesterday found that the main Thule shop is on the 4th floor of Central World (the one that has now mostly reopened next to Siam Paragon). Goodness knows how one of their websites managed to attach a Google map of Central City in Bang Na to that shop!

So now I am a happy owner of a Thule box. A smaller one than I would have self-selected from their website was recommended and fitted in the multi-storey car park (cost 28,500 baht including Thule crossbars). Fits 3 large and one small suitcase with room around the edges for miscellaneous crap. Expensive but neat, does the job I wnat it to do perfectly and comes off for storage when not needed with about 2 minutes of fiddling.

Road tested it on the journey back to SiSaket province. No noise (I only went up to 130kph) and solid as a rock. I reckon it costs about 5% of fuel costs.

I need to get used to remembering about the extra height when I am wearing it - some poor car park attendant came screaming after me after I left the ticket booth in Times Square Sukhumvit. I have discovered that most car parks will find somewhere for you if you ask nicely and have not had to resort to offering extra money yet. I have also discovered that the extra benefit of that is that they usually offer you somewhere that is under much more constant supervision than the general parking areas.

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I have discovered that most car parks will find somewhere for you if you ask nicely and have not had to resort to offering extra money yet. I have also discovered that the extra benefit of that is that they usually offer you somewhere that is under much more constant supervision than the general parking areas.

Now there's an aspect I hadn't considered.. I might have to get a roof box for my new Cayenne when it arrives... ;)

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