OEM roof rack last bolt not fitting

I have a new to me 3rd gen tacoma I picked up a few weeks ago and I've installed the oem roof rack on 2nd gens before. The oem rack is super easy to go on and putting the rack on my 3rd gen took no time....except the last bolt.

Of course it's the last bolt....

On the passenger side of the truck, the side where you put the 'rail' on yourself and a single bolt secures it in is the trouble. By using a pick I don't see there is any threads below there for this bolt to go into for starters but the bolt is way to short to make it down to the cab of the truck anyway. If you look at the Pic attached you'll see the bolt can rest on the rack and doesn't touch anything.

Am I totally missing something here? Loosing my sanity over this

 

Are all the bolts the same?

 

It's not long enough to reach the cab

 

There's 3 bolts that go into each rail that bolt it to the cab, there's 2 bolts on each side that bolt the rail to the bracket, and two bolts that bolt the bracket to the cab. There's 1 sigular long bolt that is suppose to bolt the rail to the side and that's what pictured here. Ya can't mix it up lol.

I did take the bolt from the other side out and they are the same length although it looks lime from the factory that side has a nut on it.

So I'm thinking a new nut would solve this problem and makes sense why the bolt is short to begin with.

 

So the hole in the truck roof has no threaded lug in it?

 

It's not meant to bolt the rail through the side of the rack into the truck. It's meant to just bolt the rail to the rack so the rail can pivot back and fourth. Which is why I'm thinking it's probably a nut it needs. I'll take the passenger side off tomorrow and see if either theirs a nut stuck to the underside of it from the factory or I'll go to home depot and see if I can't make something work.

 

True Value is great for this type of stuff, my neighborhood store lets me take stuff out to the parking lot to try a fit before buying it, maybe your neighborhood hardware store will do the same. Good luck- and buy a stainless one if you can.

 

I believe you might be missing a rectangular captive nut in the body of the rail. The oem packaging is absolutely horrible. When I ordered one, the rack and all the hardware were loose inside the box and some of the hardware had fallen out of the box entirely. The captive nut on mine had fallen out of the rail then out of the box.

 

Yep this is what happened. Managed to use a washer and nut to make it work.