Thule Aerobars + Thule Ski Rack = Bass Humming

You can save lots of money in gas mileage by only having the racks on when you need them... Also consider spending $100 on a trailer hitch and $40 on Hitch haul and mount all your gear on the back of the car where it won't kill your MPG or make a loud noise.

 

Don't get your hopes too high for this. My hitch mount bike rack still kills MPG, most of the bikes stick beyond the car's narrow slipstream and into the direct wind.

But it is much more convenient to load and unload, especially for the shorter spouse.

 

Yea... Wheels off and tarped up as tightly as possible for bikes. And if your skis are longer than the vehicle is wide mounting them at same height as side rear view mirrors will help a little...

 

I've never had skiis as short as my car width.

Used 210s in the old days, am now done to 174s on alpines but still longer on the free-heel varieties. Put them inside, bagged, with the tails atop the center console. No external air drag, no sandblasting of the bases nor salt or road grime in the bindings.

 

Yes, much easier to dry the bag outside the car, than to dry out the car. Don't even need to zip it all up, just use it to collect the melt and cushion against any scratches.

 

Yea... Most external mounting systems aren't design with Prius, or MPG in mind...

What I like about the hitch is it's a solid base to build your DIY rig off of...

Like last Spring...

I have a 10hp wood chipper for up to 4" diameter branches (less than 200 pounds) that I had to drive on a 1700 miles round trip last Spring. So I bolted a custom-shaped board to a chunk of steel that connected to the hitch... I then bolted the chipper to the board as low and as close to the back of the car as possible. Made sure it was a super bomb proof design and spent way, way too much time building it!

Then I dismantled and wrapped the chipper in multiple tarps so it was as small as possible with no gaps or places where the air passing over the car could get trapped, or cause a vacuum and 1700 miles later I was still at ~50mpg. Only regret is tongue weight limit of hitch is 200 pounds and everything was fine till I had to drive in SF Bay area on super nasty stretch of hwy 880 in Oakland-Berkeley area where the pace of traffic is insanely above 70mph just to get on and off that particular stretch. I knew right away the loads at those speed were gonna be bad... It bent back of hitch down 3/8 of an inch... :-(