Camper Roof | Luggage Rack

Refurbishing the Westfalia Luggage Rack

1) Referring to Page 75.8 of the Bentley, or the appropriate section in another manual, carefully remove the bolts affixing the factory luggage rack to the vehicle. The rear row of bolts will require that you at least loosen the interior headliner of the passenger cab. The original textured vinyl was peeling from my headliner, so I opted to completely remove the headliner and repaint it, but that's a task for another day. As you remove the luggage rack, be sure to keep track of all the bolts, nuts, and the rubber washers which provide a weather seal and prevent chafing of the Vanagon's paint. If the rubber washers appear deteriorated or unduly squished, replace them.

2) If your Westy spends much of its time loafing under campground trees, you will likely discover a surprising amount of rotted leaves, pine needles, seed husks, and other detritus lurking beneath your luggage rack. I found a veritable terrarium thriving under my luggage rack, and it took a couple trips to the compost bin to get it all out. There's a preventative solution for this which we'll get to later, but for now give the Vanagon roof a good washing and hand-waxing to protect the paint. With any luck, this is the first and last time it will see the light of day since leaving the Westfalia workshops.

3) Place the luggage rack on a workbench or a pair of sawhorses for easier working. If your tiedown cleats are badly rusted, drill out their rivets and remove them; if the rubber edge seal is deteriorated, remove it. Wash the whole works with plain water, and remove stubborn rust stains with very fine abrasive pads and Lime-Away, CLR, or similar product. Inspect for surface cracks or nicks; repair these with Gelcoat Patch.

4) If replacing the front or side "Westfalia" decals, carefully measure or photograph the locations of the originals. Gently scrape the decals off with a putty knife or razor blade, using acetone to loosen them. NOTE: For those concerned with authenticity, Westfalia evidently began putting the additional large decal on the front of the vans sometime during the 1985 model year. I believe the small 'prancing horse' Westfalia decals were never used on the Vanagons, and were only applied to the pre-1980 Busses.

5) If your fiberglass gelcoat needs a lot of cleaning, do it now, but do not polish or wax it yet, as your new decals will not adhere to a waxed surface. Once cleaned, use alcohol or acetone to strip any residual fiberglass cleaner from the areas in which you intend to place the decals. When dry, apply the decals and burnish down with an old credit card.

6) Follow the package directions of the Meguiar's or similar fiberglass products to polish and wax the luggage rack, being especially careful not to damage the new decals. Install the new tiedown cleats, and carefully hammer on the new edge seal. This is not intended to be a watertight seal, but only to protect the edge of the fiberglass and prevent it from chafing the paint from the Vanagon roof. If your new seal has a round 'bulb' portion, either remove it from the edge seal or be sure to cut a couple sections of it away on the corners of the luggage rack after installing, to allow rain water to properly drain. Tap the seal onto the fiberglass using a rubber mallet.

7) Use RTV to glue a screened garden hose washer into the underside of each drain hole. These will allow water to drain thru but prevent further leaves, etc. from collecting beneath your luggage rack. Use small weights to hold the screens in place while the glue sets. Because the mesh on these hose washers is so fine, they sometimes plug-up with debris before all the water has drained out. Gently clean them with an old toothbrush to keep the water flowing through.

NOTE: It's important to mount these in a convex fashion—with the screened portion pointing upward—in their final orientation. Otherwise, they will soon fill up with muck and be nearly impossible to clean. In the above photo of the underside of the luggage rack, the screen on the right is correctly glued in place; the one on the left is shown for clarity.
Be careful when chucking luggage and other accoutrements up there, as it can easily knock the screens loose, and you don't want to know what is entailed in restoring them to their original locations once the rack is re-installed.

8) Re-install the luggage rack, being sure to replace the rubber washers on the roof brackets and bolts. Wiggle the whole thing around a bit, then give all the bolts a final tightening. It is probably a good idea to check them again after you've driven 20 miles or so at highway speeds.

WATCH THIS SPACE: Now that you've got the Westfalia luggage rack all spiffed up, all that remains is to give the same treatment to the pop-up roof, and perhaps some similar attention to the canvas. Please check back for these tech write-ups in the coming months!