Sal,

If the boat's secure and you are not getting any dents in it then keep doing
what you are doing and save your money. The Sierra is a pretty stout little
boat and strapping it upside down directly to your racks should be fine.
You might consider some foam blocks between the racks and the kayak that are
cut to match the shape of the fore and aft decks (for upside down
transporting). They will protect the surface of the craft some and also
provide a less slippery interface between your rack and your boat yielding a
slightly more secure tie down.

One of the plastic boats that I had in the past would deform a lot when I
pulled hard on the tie down straps. I cut a square of 2" pink insulation
foam to match the internal height of the foredeck and shoved it into the
boat whenever I tied it down. That took care of any denting and cost nada
because it was a scrap piece of foam. Kayaking doesn't really need to be as
techy and costly as some folks like to make it out to be. Skip the fancy
rack attachments, buy an assload of sunscreen and get out on the water.

Cheers

DV


"salmoneous" wrote in message
om...
I recently bought my first kayak (yeah me - a Perception Sierra) and
have been transporting it by strapping it upside down to my Thule
bars. It seems to work well. But everyone I see is using some sort of
kayak attachment on their Thule/Yakama bars: saddles, j-bars or
stackers, etc.

I can see where these might be useful with a nice fiberglass sea kayak
or if it's necessary to carry the boat on its side. But do the
attachments add anything with an inexpensive plastic kayak? I fail to
see how strapping the kayak to bars clamped on the crossbars would be
any more stable than strapping them to the crossbars themselves.

What am I missing? Thanks for any help,
Sal