Add Factory Roof Rack to Bare Roof 90 Legacy Wagon

[Tylerman]

My ‘90 Legacy wagon project is coming together slowly, lo and behold I found a 92 wagon in a local pull-a-part and scavenged a few remaining usable parts I need. Junkyard wagon has a factory roof rack and crossbars, however mine has a clean roof with no mounting holes. Since these cars are pretty modular across trim levels, did Subaru think to add reinforcing beneath the roof regardless of whether or not it was original ordered with a rack?

[arse_sidewards]

If it's anything like the Legacy Outback (which I'd be very surprised if it's not) you'll pull the head liner of the junkyard car and under that will be brackets that attach to the perimeter frame of the roof. The screws come down through the roof skin and bolt to weld nuts on those brackets.

The roof rack isn't actually on the structure of the roof, it's feet land inboard in the roof skin, so there has to be something under there.

[Tylerman]

That’s what I had thought, either the plates with mounting holes are tacked under the roof skin or they are a loose piece that goes with the rack. I don’t relish the idea of taking the headliner out of mine only because the interior Is one of the few elements of the car that is actually in good original shape. Well I’ll keep it in the back of my mind, thanks for the feedback.

[arse_sidewards]

On a Legacy Outback the plates are separate and bolt to the roof perimeter. I assume Legacy is the same. Dropping the headliner is easy. Removing all the pillar trim you need to to drop it without breaking any of the push-in style tabs will be the hard part.