RCI Offroad Gladiator Bedrack

[RCI Offroad]

Hi everyone! RCI recently acquired a 2020 Gladiator for product R&D and will soon be launching some awesome new products for it, the first of which being our Gladiator Bed Rack! Let us know what you think, these are already in production and shipping out of our Loveland, CO manufacturing facility!

Features:
-12ga steel construction, which we have tested in-house to support 1,500lbs static weight evenly spread out over the rack (we recommend 700lbs maximum for everyday use)
-Black textured powdercoating, with a heavy duty epoxy primer basecoat
-Ability to mount anything and everything you could want on your rack with built in 3/8" slotted holes
-EASILY mount a roof top tent with no modification
-Mount bikes on the side of the rack for safe and simple transport
-Attach Rotopax, Maxtrax, Hi-lift, Shovels, Quick-fists, etc
-18" height from top of bed rail to top of rack (or we also have a 12" height option available!)
-Includes mounting brackets for attaching to your accessory track if equipped

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[Hurley82]

Hi everyone! RCI recently acquired a 2020 Gladiator for product R&D and will soon be launching some awesome new products for it, the first of which being our Gladiator Bed Rack! Let us know what you think, these are already in production and shipping out of our Loveland, CO manufacturing facility!

Features:
-12ga steel construction, which we have tested in-house to support 1,500lbs static weight evenly spread out over the rack (we recommend 700lbs maximum for everyday use)
-Black textured powdercoating, with a heavy duty epoxy primer basecoat
-Ability to mount anything and everything you could want on your rack with built in 3/8" slotted holes
-EASILY mount a roof top tent with no modification
-Mount bikes on the side of the rack for safe and simple transport
-Attach Rotopax, Maxtrax, Hi-lift, Shovels, Quick-fists, etc
-18" height from top of bed rail to top of rack (or we also have a 12" height option available!)
-Includes mounting brackets for attaching to your accessory track if equipped

Rack looks great. I stumbled across your work a few weeks ago when I was researching racks. Really like the side bike mount, very handy. I'm in Loveland also, will keep you guys in mind when my truck finally shows up.

 

[Tortooga Custom Works]

The bike side mount is my favorite feature.

Any word on it working with any of the available tonneau covers?

 

[Pion]

Ordered one earlier this month - its in the mail and should be here Saturday. I should have some hands-on with it shortly. Like you said @ralphjr, the side mount bike racks put me over. My wife and I have our cyclocross bikes, so I have two bikes I need to mount along with the rooftop tent. I'll then do the Rotopax like he has pictured along with my traction boards on the other side like he's got. Although I haven't bought the Rotopax yet.

Edit: looking at it, I don't see how it'd work with the soft tonneau that I've got without modifying the cover. It does have rubbery sides but I don't think they'd flex well around the three posts - I'll look at it when it gets here.

 

[RCI Offroad]

The bike side mount is my favorite feature.

Any word on it working with any of the available tonneau covers?

We have not confirmed the use of any Tonneau covers with the rack itself, but we do have a bracket prototyped that SHOULD allow it to work with many hard/soft covers provided you do not require the tonneau to still fold up. Some roll up covers might be able to work still though.

 

[coreoski]

Hi everyone! RCI recently acquired a 2020 Gladiator for product R&D and will soon be launching some awesome new products for it, the first of which being our Gladiator Bed Rack! Let us know what you think, these are already in production and shipping out of our Loveland, CO manufacturing facility!

Features:
-12ga steel construction, which we have tested in-house to support 1,500lbs static weight evenly spread out over the rack (we recommend 700lbs maximum for everyday use)
-Black textured powdercoating, with a heavy duty epoxy primer basecoat
-Ability to mount anything and everything you could want on your rack with built in 3/8" slotted holes
-EASILY mount a roof top tent with no modification
-Mount bikes on the side of the rack for safe and simple transport
-Attach Rotopax, Maxtrax, Hi-lift, Shovels, Quick-fists, etc
-18" height from top of bed rail to top of rack (or we also have a 12" height option available!)
-Includes mounting brackets for attaching to your accessory track if equipped

Looks awesome! Hoping to pick one up for a road trip end of August - could you share more information on what the "Additional Top Brace (+$50)" entails though?

Edit: Looking at the pictures it's hard to tell where it would go and what benefit it actually provides.

 

[WXman]

FYI, the sheetmetal on the bedsides is extremely thin. My 11 year old barely tapped mine with a piece of lumber and it left a dent that's noticeable now. So, if you're planning to hang stuff off the sides of a bed rack all the time, somebody needs to come up with some bedside protection. That's going to be the next innovative product that we need.

 

[TheITGuy]

FYI, the sheetmetal on the bedsides is extremely thin. My 11 year old barely tapped mine with a piece of lumber and it left a dent that's noticeable now. So, if you're planning to hang stuff off the sides of a bed rack all the time, somebody needs to come up with some bedside protection. That's going to be the next innovative product that we need.

Can't be any worse than the sheet metal on my Ridgeline. You look at it wrong and it leaves a dent...

 

[Tortooga Custom Works]

Can't be any worse than the sheet metal on my Ridgeline. You look at it wrong and it leaves a dent...

 

[Tortooga Custom Works]

FYI, the sheetmetal on the bedsides is extremely thin. My 11 year old barely tapped mine with a piece of lumber and it left a dent that's noticeable now. So, if you're planning to hang stuff off the sides of a bed rack all the time, somebody needs to come up with some bedside protection. That's going to be the next innovative product that we need.

You mean the bed itself? I'm confused.

 

[chcg12]

We have not confirmed the use of any Tonneau covers with the rack itself, but we do have a bracket prototyped that SHOULD allow it to work with many hard/soft covers provided you do not require the tonneau to still fold up. Some roll up covers might be able to work still though.

Can a hard shell roof top tent be mounted? Would it be able to extend over the vehicles roof or is the rack not high enough?

 

[SleepyJeep]

FYI, the sheetmetal on the bedsides is extremely thin. My 11 year old barely tapped mine with a piece of lumber and it left a dent that's noticeable now. So, if you're planning to hang stuff off the sides of a bed rack all the time, somebody needs to come up with some bedside protection. That's going to be the next innovative product that we need.

I am surprised - you are talking about the length wise sides of the truck bed right? You would think they would be made of pretty thick sheet metal cuz ppl lug all kinds of timber/metal in these beds no? I mean, I don't plan to LOL - I am waiting for a good drawer system by either Decked or Leitner designs and just going to add more storage there for me and maybe add a fridge etc LOL

 

[Pion]

Received my RCI rack today via Fed-Ex. It came really well packed - like really well - obnoxiously well packed. Packing guy must be paid well. Every piece was wrapped in cell-foam then placed within a bag. Nothing was able to rub on something else.

Although I didn't do a full mount (as I need to build my garage hoist to pull it up and off when not in use, only storage I have is to lift it), you can put it on with the soft tonneau cover rolled up towards the cab. As you can see in the 4th picture It is about 1.5 inches too long to mount while the soft tonneau locks are in place. Two T30 bolts and the locks pull out. As I don't plan on commuting to work with it on, I'll be popping it off and rolling the soft tonneau back out when I get back from weekend camping.

I really like how there are holes and slots all over the place on this rack. The flexibility for mounting is huge. I have two Yakima bicycle wheel holders that used to mount to a roof rack and I can mount them to the RCI rack easy peasy. Perfect since you pull the front wheel to put the bikes on.

Everything looks to be 1/8inch steel. The welds look good and the powdercoating/paint is good too. No exposed bits of metal or anything. I went to undergrad and grad school in physics - when they say it'll hold a 1500lb static load, I believe them. Although I could see going with the 12 inch rack to keep a rooftop tent from popping above roof height, I like the 18 inch due to how much you can mount to it. I still need to pick up Maxtrax bolts or whatever they are called - I currently have knock-off traction boards, so I might fiddle with a different bolt to connect them to the provided Maxtrax brackets.

 

[coreoski]

Received my RCI rack today via Fed-Ex. It came really well packed - like really well - obnoxiously well packed. Packing guy must be paid well. Every piece was wrapped in cell-foam then placed within a bag. Nothing was able to rub on something else.

Although I didn't do a full mount (as I need to build my garage hoist to pull it up and off when not in use, only storage I have is to lift it), you can put it on with the soft tonneau cover rolled up towards the cab. As you can see in the 4th picture It is about 1.5 inches too long to mount while the soft tonneau locks are in place. Two T30 bolts and the locks pull out. As I don't plan on commuting to work with it on, I'll be popping it off and rolling the soft tonneau back out when I get back from weekend camping.

I really like how there are holes and slots all over the place on this rack. The flexibility for mounting is huge. I have two Yakima bicycle wheel holders that used to mount to a roof rack and I can mount them to the RCI rack easy peasy. Perfect since you pull the front wheel to put the bikes on.

Everything looks to be 1/8inch steel. The welds look good and the powdercoating/paint is good too. No exposed bits of metal or anything. I went to undergrad and grad school in physics - when they say it'll hold a 1500lb static load, I believe them. Although I could see going with the 12 inch rack to keep a rooftop tent from popping above roof height, I like the 18 inch due to how much you can mount to it. I still need to pick up Maxtrax bolts or whatever they are called - I currently have knock-off traction boards, so I might fiddle with a different bolt to connect them to the provided Maxtrax brackets.

Pics look promising! Thanks for sharing.

I take it you did not opt for the additional top brace, correct?

Trying to visualize what that is and my best guess is a dual longitudinal brace setup, but maybe with possible lateral adjustment via long slotted holes?

 

[Pion]

Pics look promising! Thanks for sharing.

I take it you did not opt for the additional top brace, correct?

Trying to visualize what that is and my best guess is a dual longitudinal brace setup, but maybe with possible lateral adjustment via long slotted holes?

I did do the extra brace and did use the long slotted holes and placed them equidistant from the center. Once everything is bolted it is very stiff (14mm carriage bolts on the rack, 13mm and 11mm for the bike accessories). No racking, flexing, creaking, or anything when testing by sitting and standing on it (I'm 6'4", 235lb). You have a lot of options to pick when placing the supports and side panels, which could adjust to your personal needs for how you mount stuff on it. I have two front tire mounts I haven't put on yet because I'm not sure where I want them (near the tailgate for access but blocking other stuff in the bed, or near the cab so stuff is accessible but harder to get to the wheels). You can see I have it mounted and I didn't take off the soft tonneau, just the locks near the tailgate.

I have one, what I expect to be minor nitpick. The adapters for the trail rail system are a plate with a threaded bolt (with no head on the bolt) welded into a hole in the plate. As the back side of the plate is smooth, there isn't much there for the weld to grab to. It may have been my fault, but when the 200lb gorilla started wrenching I pulled one of the posts out of the plate (maybe it was a weak weld too as I only got one thread into the nylon). My neighbor has a welder and he fixed it in 3 seconds. The reason why I tried to tighten it as much as I did was that the threads had barely gotten to the nylon lock portion of the nut and i was expecting the threads to pop through a bit more. I don't know that it is necessary to change how the threaded bolt is welded to the plate, but maybe making it a little longer so one can have some confidence that the nylon portion is actually locking on the treads. I just snugged them to where the plate and washer don't move and nothing further. I'll probably just toss some Locktite on them since I don't plan on taking the adapter plates off.

One should really make sure to set the width of the rack to be well adjusted for the bed (it can fit a variety of bed widths). Although loading will present some "spread" to the rack as the support arms are angled, if there is any gap when you have a few hundred pounds on the rack it will try and move and put a lot of force on the trail rail adapter plates (those posts aren't designed for that kind of load). If it is a snug, no gap fit with no loading, you'll benefit from the bedsides being pressed by the feet of the rack once loaded and then I'd only imagine a catastrophic event would cause a problem. I spent a lot of time making sure things were square, a snug fit, and so forth. It feels really darn strong.

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