OEM Tacoma Roof Rack

Hi, new to this world! Just bought a 2018 Tacoma, she’s gorgeous!

I purchased the factory OEM roof rack that swivels because I already had a Thule roof box.
However, upon throwing the box on the roof, it appears the oem bars are too far apart to fit the box...
the descrition of the rack says “adjustable”... but I don’t see any way to adjust these things to be closer together...
My roof box is pretty common, but I may have wrongly assumed that it would fit the truck bars..
Thoughts?

 

Do you have the crossbars?

 

The oem roof rack has cross bars that swivel perpendicular to the rack. Pictures of what you have may be required so we can see what you have.

 

Welcome to TW!

 

The word adjustable may be very misleading.

 

I'm afraid they are no at all adjustable, they state that but I believe they refer to the ability of the roof rack to be stowed perpendicular to the rack but you cannot adjust them in distance from one another, sorry.

 

I am also looking to buy a box for my OEM roof wracks on my 2018 tscomT.. anyone know which box would work ? Or you guys would recommend that works well with the stock wracking system....

 

I'd think almost any would work well. I don't have the OEM racks but I can't imagine it is much wider than a standard 4 door. The Yakima my parents had on their Tahoe was great for skis.

 

So here are a couple of pics showing the rack. They simply swing out, just like those on my previous vehicle, 2015 Subi outback. Neat feature, but the bars on the Tacoma are much longer, which inherently means they’ll be further apart. They are 44” apart when opened, and standard Thule roof boxes have a max distance between feet of 38”....

 

This explains why a 3rd Gen Tacoma I see driving around my town has the OEM rack in the closed position with Thule Cross bars attached and a roof top box on top. I always thought that was weird or redundant, I guess they had the same issue you had.

Makes much mores sense now.

 

Yeah, that’s my next thought... wonder if that’s safe...? I suppose it would be...
Hmmm

 

I'm sure it's secure, the issue I had with the OEM rack (without even realizing the limitation posted in this thread), was the weight max of 100lb. Maybe if the Thule/Yakima load bars are sturdier you could stretch that, but my concern would be weight. And it's also just raising the height of everything unnecessarily as apposed to just a traditional cross bar setup.

 

Yeah, 100lbs is not much in a box that size...

 

Curious on what you did I’m in the same exact boat.

 

Well, I’m kinda sour on the racks to be honest, why would Toyota sell a rack system that doesn’t accomodate the most popular standard roof boxes that are on the market... grrrr

That said, I had a friend who had some old Yakima roof bars with the feet that attached to her old factory Subaru rack. I was able to simply attach them to the oem bars & we’re on the road...

 

& I never weighed the load I threw in there, but I’m fairly certain I overloaded it by a significant amount...

 

Yep... That’s what I did...

 

What models did you guys use I do not want to order something that isn’t going to work again. And more importantly I’m not going to listen to the woman if I can’t put the box on the truck.

 

I got the oem rack from the yota dealer when I bought the truck...
I have no idea what model the yakima bars are, old though...

 

Yeah I’m hoping to find some cross bars I can toss on the OEM rack so that I can use my rooftop box similar to what you did. Hopefully I can find some that are easy on and off so I don’t have to keep them on at all times. I just do not want to order a bunch that won’t work.