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Installed Rebel Off Road Bed Rack

Klutch

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Last weekend I sprayed the Gladiator bed with U-Pol Raptor. The instructions said it takes 5-7 days to completely dry/cure. So, I waited a week and yesterday started bolting together the bed rack I ordered from @RebelOffRoad.

I looked at a lot of bed racks online. Most weren't specifically designed for a Gladiator and didn't fit very well. I wanted a full height rack to mount my hard shell roof top tent, so a half rack wasn't an option. Some appeared to be a bit delicate. I was looking hard at the Leitner rack. It wasn't quite high enough to allow my roof top tent to clear the rear of the cab. I would have to install spacers of some kind. I was looking into what kind of spacers I would need when I saw the Rebel Off Road rack which appeared to provide the necessary height without any spacers.

I called Rebel Off Road and the rep was very helpful. I got the black rack with the table mount. I also needed bed rails since my JT doesn't have them. Surprisingly, the whole kit was on my porch three days later.

Everything came packed EXTREMELY well.

Jeep Gladiator Installed Rebel Off Road Bed Rack 002.JPG


I followed the recommendation in the instructions and laid everything out on a furniture pad.

Jeep Gladiator Installed Rebel Off Road Bed Rack 003.JPG


Laying out the components quickly revealed this is one heavy-duty rack! It's like a giant, beefy erector set. (OK, I'm dating myself referencing that toy from the past.) I was also impressed by the fasteners. This might seem trivial, but it's very important to me. I really hate assembling something and seeing the fasteners are complete junk. Then I have to go source my own fasteners which takes a lot of time and more money. Every nut is a lock nut. I was disappointed to see the fasteners were shiny, bare metal. Doh! It's my bad. Rebel Off Road offers a blackened fastener kit. I just forgot to ask for it.

The instruction manuals are pretty thorough. They have many pages, they're printed in a large font (Yay!) and they have pictures. There were separate manuals for the rack, bed rails and table mount.

It's a bit awkward getting the pieces assembled. Every step in the manual stresses to leave the fasteners finger tight. But since these are lock nuts, you can't get them past more than a few threads by hand. So, I used a ratchet and socket to get the nuts threaded just shy of tight allowing everything to move for adjustment.

The manual recommends getting a friend to assist bolting in the three supports. But I was alone and managed to get it done. Here's the first support.

Jeep Gladiator Installed Rebel Off Road Bed Rack 006.JPG


One constant concern was all that metal and my ratchet so dangerously close to the rear glass. If I was to do it again, I would tape a piece of plywood to the rear window just for peace of mind. It would really suck to shatter that back window.

After much twisting of ratchets, I got the other two supports in place (finger tight!).

Jeep Gladiator Installed Rebel Off Road Bed Rack 012.JPG


I like to take my time to do things carefully (and to avoid shattering my back window!). Thus, it took me most of the day to get everything bolted together. Then I took a lot of time to get everything square and adjusted to my liking. Yeah, it was a lot of work, but I'm a glutton for punishment and I actually enjoy doing things like this.

Jeep Gladiator Installed Rebel Off Road Bed Rack 014.JPG


I don't like the look of those bright, shiny fasteners contrasting with the black finish of the rack. I'm going to come up with a plan to blacken those myself. Here's another view.

Jeep Gladiator Installed Rebel Off Road Bed Rack 016.JPG


This rack has an emphasis on Brutalism over elegance. I'm quite confident if I was to buy a surplus 16" Iowa class battleship gun, I could simply strap that gun to the top of this rack and go. Yeah, it's that strong.

Next came the table mount. Sheesh, this thing has only a few parts, but boy was it frustrating. The instruction manual has pictures, but they're all very close up. I didn't have an idea as to how and exactly where this thing attached to the rack. I followed the instructions as best I could, but mostly figured it out through trial and error; of which there was much. By this point I was pretty wiped out after twisting ratchets all day. I eventually got it done. It's a really spiffy accessory. I also bought the Lifetime table from Rebel Off Road. Sorry, didn't get a picture of it installed. If anyone in interested, I'll take a few more happy snaps with the table and post them up.

Jeep Gladiator Installed Rebel Off Road Bed Rack 017.JPG


And here it is all together and out in the open. You might think it appears a bit dorky with factory tires. I plan to install a minor lift and larger tires. But I really want to get some miles out of the factory tires before I throw them away. My build is mostly for camping and basic overlanding. I won't be doing any extreme trails or rock crawling. Anyway, thus far, I'm really happy with this bed rack. I'm hoping to get friends over this weekend to help me get the roof top tent on top of the rack. (It's a Tepui Hybox.)

Jeep Gladiator Installed Rebel Off Road Bed Rack 019.JPG
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hlan

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Nice! Do you know if any tonneau covers will also fit “under” the rack?
 
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Klutch

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Nice! Do you know if any tonneau covers will also fit “under” the rack?
My JT had the factory tonneau cover, which I really like. Unfortunately, it doesn't work with this bed rack; or any manufactured bed rack as far I can tell. Rebel Off Road does sell a bed cover that works with their rack. I will likely install that to keep dirt out of the bed and out of my gear.
 

hlan

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Thanks! I have a hard trifold which I really want to keep but it’s looking like I may need to sell it to get a full height roof rack.
 

MMMII

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If anyone in interested, I'll take a few more happy snaps with the table and post them up.
I moved my eye from the JCR to this but in the half rack config. If you could post some pics of the table mount that would be great.

Looks sharp.
 

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RebelOffRoad

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I moved my eye from the JCR to this but in the half rack config. If you could post some pics of the table mount that would be great.

Looks sharp.
I'll get some better photos today. Have a new wide angle lens that will make grabbing a photo a lot easier.

Jeep Gladiator Installed Rebel Off Road Bed Rack RebelOffRoad-03099
Jeep Gladiator Installed Rebel Off Road Bed Rack IMG_1575.JPG
Jeep Gladiator Installed Rebel Off Road Bed Rack IMG_1490.JPG
 

RebelOffRoad

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Last weekend I sprayed the Gladiator bed with U-Pol Raptor. The instructions said it takes 5-7 days to completely dry/cure. So, I waited a week and yesterday started bolting together the bed rack I ordered from @RebelOffRoad.

I looked at a lot of bed racks online. Most weren't specifically designed for a Gladiator and didn't fit very well. I wanted a full height rack to mount my hard shell roof top tent, so a half rack wasn't an option. Some appeared to be a bit delicate. I was looking hard at the Leitner rack. It wasn't quite high enough to allow my roof top tent to clear the rear of the cab. I would have to install spacers of some kind. I was looking into what kind of spacers I would need when I saw the Rebel Off Road rack which appeared to provide the necessary height without any spacers.

I called Rebel Off Road and the rep was very helpful. I got the black rack with the table mount. I also needed bed rails since my JT doesn't have them. Surprisingly, the whole kit was on my porch three days later.

Everything came packed EXTREMELY well.

Jeep Gladiator Installed Rebel Off Road Bed Rack IMG_1490.JPG


I followed the recommendation in the instructions and laid everything out on a furniture pad.

Jeep Gladiator Installed Rebel Off Road Bed Rack IMG_1490.JPG


Laying out the components quickly revealed this is one heavy-duty rack! It's like a giant, beefy erector set. (OK, I'm dating myself referencing that toy from the past.) I was also impressed by the fasteners. This might seem trivial, but it's very important to me. I really hate assembling something and seeing the fasteners are complete junk. Then I have to go source my own fasteners which takes a lot of time and more money. Every nut is a lock nut. I was disappointed to see the fasteners were shiny, bare metal. Doh! It's my bad. Rebel Off Road offers a blackened fastener kit. I just forgot to ask for it.

The instruction manuals are pretty thorough. They have many pages, they're printed in a large font (Yay!) and they have pictures. There were separate manuals for the rack, bed rails and table mount.

It's a bit awkward getting the pieces assembled. Every step in the manual stresses to leave the fasteners finger tight. But since these are lock nuts, you can't get them past more than a few threads by hand. So, I used a ratchet and socket to get the nuts threaded just shy of tight allowing everything to move for adjustment.

The manual recommends getting a friend to assist bolting in the three supports. But I was alone and managed to get it done. Here's the first support.

Jeep Gladiator Installed Rebel Off Road Bed Rack IMG_1490.JPG


One constant concern was all that metal and my ratchet so dangerously close to the rear glass. If I was to do it again, I would tape a piece of plywood to the rear window just for peace of mind. It would really suck to shatter that back window.

After much twisting of ratchets, I got the other two supports in place (finger tight!).

Jeep Gladiator Installed Rebel Off Road Bed Rack IMG_1490.JPG


I like to take my time to do things carefully (and to avoid shattering my back window!). Thus, it took me most of the day to get everything bolted together. Then I took a lot of time to get everything square and adjusted to my liking. Yeah, it was a lot of work, but I'm a glutton for punishment and I actually enjoy doing things like this.

Jeep Gladiator Installed Rebel Off Road Bed Rack IMG_1490.JPG


I don't like the look of those bright, shiny fasteners contrasting with the black finish of the rack. I'm going to come up with a plan to blacken those myself. Here's another view.

Jeep Gladiator Installed Rebel Off Road Bed Rack IMG_1490.JPG


This rack has an emphasis on Brutalism over elegance. I'm quite confident if I was to buy a surplus 16" Iowa class battleship gun, I could simply strap that gun to the top of this rack and go. Yeah, it's that strong.

Next came the table mount. Sheesh, this thing has only a few parts, but boy was it frustrating. The instruction manual has pictures, but they're all very close up. I didn't have an idea as to how and exactly where this thing attached to the rack. I followed the instructions as best I could, but mostly figured it out through trial and error; of which there was much. By this point I was pretty wiped out after twisting ratchets all day. I eventually got it done. It's a really spiffy accessory. I also bought the Lifetime table from Rebel Off Road. Sorry, didn't get a picture of it installed. If anyone in interested, I'll take a few more happy snaps with the table and post them up.

Jeep Gladiator Installed Rebel Off Road Bed Rack IMG_1490.JPG


And here it is all together and out in the open. You might think it appears a bit dorky with factory tires. I plan to install a minor lift and larger tires. But I really want to get some miles out of the factory tires before I throw them away. My build is mostly for camping and basic overlanding. I won't be doing any extreme trails or rock crawling. Anyway, thus far, I'm really happy with this bed rack. I'm hoping to get friends over this weekend to help me get the roof top tent on top of the rack. (It's a Tepui Hybox.)

Jeep Gladiator Installed Rebel Off Road Bed Rack IMG_1490.JPG
Thank you for the honest and great review. We're going to work on a quick video to assist with the table mount.
 

MikeR1

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Last weekend I sprayed the Gladiator bed with U-Pol Raptor. The instructions said it takes 5-7 days to completely dry/cure. So, I waited a week and yesterday started bolting together the bed rack I ordered from @RebelOffRoad.

I looked at a lot of bed racks online. Most weren't specifically designed for a Gladiator and didn't fit very well. I wanted a full height rack to mount my hard shell roof top tent, so a half rack wasn't an option. Some appeared to be a bit delicate. I was looking hard at the Leitner rack. It wasn't quite high enough to allow my roof top tent to clear the rear of the cab. I would have to install spacers of some kind. I was looking into what kind of spacers I would need when I saw the Rebel Off Road rack which appeared to provide the necessary height without any spacers.

I called Rebel Off Road and the rep was very helpful. I got the black rack with the table mount. I also needed bed rails since my JT doesn't have them. Surprisingly, the whole kit was on my porch three days later.

Everything came packed EXTREMELY well.

Jeep Gladiator Installed Rebel Off Road Bed Rack IMG_1490.JPG


I followed the recommendation in the instructions and laid everything out on a furniture pad.

Jeep Gladiator Installed Rebel Off Road Bed Rack IMG_1490.JPG


Laying out the components quickly revealed this is one heavy-duty rack! It's like a giant, beefy erector set. (OK, I'm dating myself referencing that toy from the past.) I was also impressed by the fasteners. This might seem trivial, but it's very important to me. I really hate assembling something and seeing the fasteners are complete junk. Then I have to go source my own fasteners which takes a lot of time and more money. Every nut is a lock nut. I was disappointed to see the fasteners were shiny, bare metal. Doh! It's my bad. Rebel Off Road offers a blackened fastener kit. I just forgot to ask for it.

The instruction manuals are pretty thorough. They have many pages, they're printed in a large font (Yay!) and they have pictures. There were separate manuals for the rack, bed rails and table mount.

It's a bit awkward getting the pieces assembled. Every step in the manual stresses to leave the fasteners finger tight. But since these are lock nuts, you can't get them past more than a few threads by hand. So, I used a ratchet and socket to get the nuts threaded just shy of tight allowing everything to move for adjustment.

The manual recommends getting a friend to assist bolting in the three supports. But I was alone and managed to get it done. Here's the first support.

Jeep Gladiator Installed Rebel Off Road Bed Rack IMG_1490.JPG


One constant concern was all that metal and my ratchet so dangerously close to the rear glass. If I was to do it again, I would tape a piece of plywood to the rear window just for peace of mind. It would really suck to shatter that back window.

After much twisting of ratchets, I got the other two supports in place (finger tight!).

Jeep Gladiator Installed Rebel Off Road Bed Rack IMG_1490.JPG


I like to take my time to do things carefully (and to avoid shattering my back window!). Thus, it took me most of the day to get everything bolted together. Then I took a lot of time to get everything square and adjusted to my liking. Yeah, it was a lot of work, but I'm a glutton for punishment and I actually enjoy doing things like this.

Jeep Gladiator Installed Rebel Off Road Bed Rack IMG_1490.JPG


I don't like the look of those bright, shiny fasteners contrasting with the black finish of the rack. I'm going to come up with a plan to blacken those myself. Here's another view.

Jeep Gladiator Installed Rebel Off Road Bed Rack IMG_1490.JPG


This rack has an emphasis on Brutalism over elegance. I'm quite confident if I was to buy a surplus 16" Iowa class battleship gun, I could simply strap that gun to the top of this rack and go. Yeah, it's that strong.

Next came the table mount. Sheesh, this thing has only a few parts, but boy was it frustrating. The instruction manual has pictures, but they're all very close up. I didn't have an idea as to how and exactly where this thing attached to the rack. I followed the instructions as best I could, but mostly figured it out through trial and error; of which there was much. By this point I was pretty wiped out after twisting ratchets all day. I eventually got it done. It's a really spiffy accessory. I also bought the Lifetime table from Rebel Off Road. Sorry, didn't get a picture of it installed. If anyone in interested, I'll take a few more happy snaps with the table and post them up.

Jeep Gladiator Installed Rebel Off Road Bed Rack IMG_1490.JPG


And here it is all together and out in the open. You might think it appears a bit dorky with factory tires. I plan to install a minor lift and larger tires. But I really want to get some miles out of the factory tires before I throw them away. My build is mostly for camping and basic overlanding. I won't be doing any extreme trails or rock crawling. Anyway, thus far, I'm really happy with this bed rack. I'm hoping to get friends over this weekend to help me get the roof top tent on top of the rack. (It's a Tepui Hybox.)

Jeep Gladiator Installed Rebel Off Road Bed Rack IMG_1490.JPG
Nice rack you got. I know it has been a while but I hope you had enjoyed your rack. I just order an RSI Rack for mine and cannot wait to have it and see how it goes.
 
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Klutch

Klutch

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Nice rack you got. I know it has been a while but I hope you had enjoyed your rack. I just order an RSI Rack for mine and cannot wait to have it and see how it goes.
I'm still very happy with the Rebel Off Road rack. I have tied many things to it when I'm hauling with my Gladiator. Whenever I camp there's invariably a torrential downpour in the middle of the night. It sure is nice being way up high in the roof top tent not having to worry about flooding. :)
 
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MikeR1

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Glad you still love it. Correct... nothing worse that being on the floor and worry about flooding.
 

MikeR1

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I was taking a look at this post again and I have to admit that your rack looks prettty and solid. I have seen some other racks out here and I would not feel confident of putting a RTT on it. By the way, what RTT did you get?
 

Blitzinger

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Excellent write up. Quick question. When you say fasteners, you mean there's no drilling, right? You just tighten the bolts and it closes like a vice?

I'm new to all this and wanting a bed rack and was looking at this
 

Jeepasaurus_Rex

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Excellent write up. Quick question. When you say fasteners, you mean there's no drilling, right? You just tighten the bolts and it closes like a vice?

I'm new to all this and wanting a bed rack and was looking at this
No drilling at all!
 
 



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