4000+ miles this summer - The Gladiator Is The Ultimate Adventure Vehicle For Me

[XJADDICTION]

4000+ miles this summer and adventure all over Michigan, Wisconsin, Indiana and Tennessee. My Gladiator does it all very well!

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[Cyclopsrider]

Great trip! Love your setup. Just ordered a Gladiator, very excited to do similar excursions in the near future. I am not familiar with the bike rack you have. Does it mount to the side rails, over the Tonneau cover? Any info would be appreciated. Bike rack and Tonneau. I am looking at the Lomax hard tri fold right now. Currently have a trailer hitch Thule that works well, but it takes up the hitch. Looking for options. Lake of the Clouds is something special.

 

[Alans17]

We just wrapped a 10-state, 3-week trip. The truck handled it flawlessly. Traveled over 5k miles and 140 hours in the driver’s seat. ?

 

[XJADDICTION]

Great trip! Love your setup. Just ordered a Gladiator, very excited to do similar excursions in the near future. I am not familiar with the bike rack you have. Does it mount to the side rails, over the Tonneau cover? Any info would be appreciated. Bike rack and Tonneau. I am looking at the Lomax hard tri fold right now. Currently have a trailer hitch Thule that works well, but it takes up the hitch. Looking for options. Lake of the Clouds is something special.

I bought my JT back in October of 2019. Nothing was available for racks and bike carrier that allowed me to still use my hitch and protected my expensive mountain bikes from car driving phone zombies.

Mine is 3/4 marine grade plywood with medium textured deck paint. The rack was a freebie from my b-in-laws Toyota truck. I took the rear fenders off, the gas cap plastic surround and the plastic bed rail caps. I did this so that I could see and reach the existing bed rail holes. I did drill through the plastic rail covers. I trimmed the rack height dawn to match a single Yakima gutter mount affixed to the hard top.

On the plywood bed cover I mounted the top of gutter Yakima towers with a 1/4 “ player under it so that I had room for the load bar attachments. In the bed from front to back I made a simple 2x4 ladder type frame to go on the middle and bolt through the plywood hardcover. Sturdy enough to walk on and I have the intention to add a y’all drawer system to each side of support.

I have over 25,000 miles on this setup carrying up to 16’ lumber for my house, kayaks, canoe, bikes (depends on rack load but empty upper rack I could carry 6 bikes. Plus with locking tailgate everything is secure.

I would go with a hard cover as you are now that they are available. JCR off-road has some nice side mount bike attachments for their rack system. I made my own before I saw theirs and it works well, just like the bikes over the bed currently.

If you have any questions search the forum for bike racks and all pics will show up there. Also PM me for anything you can’t find an answer to.

Lake of the Clouds and the UP in general is incredible!

 

[DaveL]

Wonderful post. Great countryside. Great photos.

 

[CerOf]

Nice thumper!

 

[XJADDICTION]

Nice thumper!

Gotta love them! One
More trip to the UP end of October... then a winter of rebuild for the old Thumper! Next year...headed west!

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