The best of both worlds!
I had previously mounted my Roofnest RTT directly on top of the cross bars of my Tradesman roof rack, but it just proved to be too tall. The tradesman roof rack already added almost 7” of height to top of the truck, and then to have the RTT on top of that just gave me a really tall set up, and really noisy ride with all that wind drag, plus I couldn’t really take advantage of the roof rack storage space, with the RTT on top. And in the few times where I mounted a surfboard on top of the RTT cross bars, I needed a friggin painters ladder to get up there.…
so what to do? Roofnest does not make a gutter rail mounting kit for the FJ60 or the 80 series. BUT….GFC does! The problem is that the way in which the GFC RTTs mount to the gutter rails, it doesn’t work for the Roofnest. So after some brainstorming, multiple trips to OSH (now known as Outdoor Supply Hardware, but the old Orchard Supply Hardware), I came up with the following solution (see pics below). And I think it turned out great. I was a little concerned about the sturdiness of it, and just how solid it would feel, but I road tested it this past weekend on the way to French Meadows Reservoir (between Auburn and Tahoe) on gravel fire roads, rutted dirt roads, etc. Not hard core wheeling, but plenty of bumpy trail riding for hours and I gotta say, it’s a solid set up. I now have an RTT that sits about 3/8 of an inch above my roofline (at the highest point of the FJ62 roof) and significantly reduced the wind noise while driving, plus makes accessing the cross bars for surfboards, SUPs, much more practical.
Huge shout out to GFC for making a ridiculously well thought out and stout gutter rail mounting kit, and I’ve always loved my Roofnest RTT since the day I got it.
I had previously mounted my Roofnest RTT directly on top of the cross bars of my Tradesman roof rack, but it just proved to be too tall. The tradesman roof rack already added almost 7” of height to top of the truck, and then to have the RTT on top of that just gave me a really tall set up, and really noisy ride with all that wind drag, plus I couldn’t really take advantage of the roof rack storage space, with the RTT on top. And in the few times where I mounted a surfboard on top of the RTT cross bars, I needed a friggin painters ladder to get up there.…
so what to do? Roofnest does not make a gutter rail mounting kit for the FJ60 or the 80 series. BUT….GFC does! The problem is that the way in which the GFC RTTs mount to the gutter rails, it doesn’t work for the Roofnest. So after some brainstorming, multiple trips to OSH (now known as Outdoor Supply Hardware, but the old Orchard Supply Hardware), I came up with the following solution (see pics below). And I think it turned out great. I was a little concerned about the sturdiness of it, and just how solid it would feel, but I road tested it this past weekend on the way to French Meadows Reservoir (between Auburn and Tahoe) on gravel fire roads, rutted dirt roads, etc. Not hard core wheeling, but plenty of bumpy trail riding for hours and I gotta say, it’s a solid set up. I now have an RTT that sits about 3/8 of an inch above my roofline (at the highest point of the FJ62 roof) and significantly reduced the wind noise while driving, plus makes accessing the cross bars for surfboards, SUPs, much more practical.
Huge shout out to GFC for making a ridiculously well thought out and stout gutter rail mounting kit, and I’ve always loved my Roofnest RTT since the day I got it.
