Originally Posted by alpinhi

I guess Ill be that guy, I didn't want to pay a whole lot for a rack but needed one since my spare wouldn't fit in the factory spot anymore. I ended going for the Rola rack off of amazon, I did opt to add the center extension to add some length and Im glad I did because I use every inch of it on trips. The brackets that come with the Rola rack attach to your factory cross bars on the luggage rack. I didn't even put those on, just threw them in the trash and opted for the 4XInovations Rola rack lowering brackets. I wanted the rack to have a low profile and not stick up like some of those goofing looking baskets and I wanted the truck to still fit in the garage when the rack was empty.

Long story short, some people complained about Rola rusting and dripping rusty water on their vehicles. Rola now sends rubber sleeves that slide over the connection joints to help prevent this. I took it one step farther and put black RTV around all the screws and connections then put the sleeve over. I have had this rack in the midwest for 5 years with zero rust or powder coat flaking off. The rack says its rated for 200lbs of weight but I can crawl on top of it fully loaded with the spare, fuel can, and gear with no issues at all. The one issue I did have early on was the front fairing would hum badly at highway speeds, the mounting screws couldn't get it tight enough. I had a cheap remedy that worked like a charm, I pulled the fairing back off and wrapped the front tube that the fairing mounts to with a bicycle inner tube and re-installed the faring over it and that did it. You can't see the inner tube or even know its there. A little ghetto you say, maybe but it was cheap fix for an annoying problem. I love the rack and it was only meant to be short term use until I saved up for a "nice" rack. I like it so much I haven't changed it and it has been throughs trails in Moab and all over Colorado including the entire Kokopelli Trail. I have just under $300 totally invested in it.