Yakima and Thule and the two big names in removable roof racks. Thule has a better reputation when it comes to European cars (I suspect because Thule and the European car manufacturers work together to an extent that would be a violation of US anti-Trust laws in the US). Yakima has to go by what the car makers SAY the specs are (These are public records) as opposed to working with the car makers in making sure the rack and car have a tight as fit as possible. Thus, when I last did research on this 10 years ago, you had a lot of people on the net saying Thule was the better system, but almost all of them had European Cars.
On the other hand I liked my Yakima rack (Which Yakima has improved since I purchased a rack from them). It did everything I expected of it. I did have some additional wind noise where the clip of the rack fitted into the door, but that was my only problem.
Now when my Lumina was wrecked, I purchased my Jeep (Which I still have) but Yakima had no clips for Jeep Wranglers do to its design. This and the greater height of the Jeep that made it harder to get the bike onto the Roof made me opt for a bike Rack that fitted over the Spare wheel for my Jeep.
As to my Lumina, you had to lift the bike onto the roof, but given most bikes are less than 30 pounds that was NOT much of a Problem, even my sister who was five foot Four was able to do it (Through with some difficulty when it came to putting bikes in the MIDDLE of the rack, she still could do it on the edge). The Rack itself could be quite heavy if you installed ALL of the parts, but quite light if you broke it down and reassembled it on the roof when you needed it (Most parts fitted on to the steel rods with one attachment on each of the two rods).
Yakima had three systems, one that attached to any rain gutter you may have, a Second one that required permanent holes to be drilled (This what was recommend for my Jeep Wrangler) and the third and most popular system one that attached to the doors of the car (This is what I had for my Lumina).
The Yakima system had four parts, the various actual bike holders (of these more later), two steel posts that went from one side of the car to the other, four "Towers" (These were sold as sets of Four) that connected the Steel Posts to car via "Clips". The "Clips" came in sets of four, with a different clip for each model car. I ended up with two sets, one for my Lumina and another for my Sister's Sable. Hauled 4-5 bikes at a time. Yakima had two bikes holders at that time, and more now, all very good at keeping the bike on the car. If you took the rack apart it could take you 15-20 minutes to attached and re-attached the Rack, through only about 5 minutes if all you did was loosens the clips from the Towers and when all the clips were lose pick up the rack as one unit (Which is what I did, but then I am 6'2").
I mention this is that the Rack in addition to carrying bikes could also tote what Yakima called "Rocket Boxes" if you needed more storage AND and a open rack for things like a Spare Tire. The great Advantage of this is that you could opt for a FULL SIZE Tire instead of a Balloon. Just a different way to look on how to haul bicycles.
For more on Yakima Racks see:
http://www.yakima.com/After I wrote the Above I went to the "Fit" Guide for A Saturn Vue, and found it came with a Factory Installed Roof rack. Yakima has adapters for that Rack for its Rack in addition to having Rear Racks.
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