Surfboard Racks for Cars - Hard & Soft Surf Racks

Although surfboards are designed to take a heavy pounding in the water, they are surprisingly easy to damage when they are out of the water. Transporting your surfboards ding free to the beach is easy with the right surfboard rack for your vehicle. If you have a truck you can get pickup truck surf racks. First let's take a look at the different surf racks systems available for cars.

You have several options available when it comes to choosing the best surfboard rack for your car. If you already have a car rack, you may be just fine purchasing a set of surfboard pads to put on your existing car rack. Surfboard pads for car racks are the cheapest option available. Dakine make a set of rack pads for $20.

There are also surfboard add-ons for roof rack systems such as Thule and Yakima.

If you do not have a car rack already there are two systems from which you can choose. The first and the cheaper option of the two systems are the soft car racks for surfboards. These are great for their portability. If you are going on a trip and plan to rent a vehicle, these are lightweight and attach to almost all cars and SUV's. The only exception is that they do not work well with 2 door vehicles. The way the pads mount to the roof of the vehicle is by wrapping two straps across the roof and through the vehicle. This is a surprisingly simple and secure mounting system. The cost of these surfboard racks is between $35 and $45 and they can transport between 2 to 6 surfboards depending upon the rack you purchase.

This option is more expensive than the soft car racks. They work with all cars and SUV's, including two door cars. These hard surf racks come with two center bars. Some of the racks will only work with vehicles with rain gutters and others work on vehicles without rain gutters. If you have a vehicle without rain gutters for example, Block Surf have a hard rack that you order without the “hook mounts”. This is what attaches to the rain gutter on the car roof. You would purchase the Block Surf option with the “Pass Thru”mounting system.

Simply putting your surfboard in the back of your pickup truck and tying it down with a bungee cord isn't a good idea. You will not get good lateral stability and it is likely your board is going to shift around in the back of the truck. There are a couple of options you have for tailgate racks for surfboards. The simplest mounting system by Block Surf is well priced around $25. You will have your surfboard loaded in no time.

The other surfboard rack for pickup trucks is designed with anti-theft in mind. SteelCore make a surfboard rack for your truck with cut-resistant straps that have an inner steel core. The straps have a buckle that locks with a key, providing more security for your surfboards. The price of the SteelCore rack is around $80.