Thule Bike Rack Install Over Bed

In 2006 when I bought my Tacoma there was no way to install a bike rack over the bed of the truck so i built one. Now there are tonneau covers that you can buy that have the bars as part of them but since i had most of the parts anyways from my old truck i bought a cheaper tonneau cover and built it the same way. I did not take photos throughout the whole process but i got enough i think for the steps.

First piece you need are 54" Top Tracks. They are made for the top of mini vans but work great for the bed rails.
https://www.thule.com/en-us/us/roof-rack/accessories/thule-top-tracks-54-_-6270999

They come with rivets that you drill into your bed rails and insert them into. You then screw the tracks into the rivets. Here is a picture of the rivets installed in the bed rail.



The system comes with a tool to insert and set the rivets. It sucks. I used it for my Taco but after the first couple this time it was not working that good so i found a tool to set them. Its most likely the only time I will use it so if you're in NC you can barrow mine.


After you drill and set all the rivets you can attach the tracks. It comes with screws to attach it. I wanted to make it more secure so i when to Home depot and bought some longer M5 screws and nuts to attach from the bottom side of the bed rail on some of the attachment points. If the rivet comes lose for some reason the nut on the other side would keep it attached. I did not do this with my Taco but for some reason I felt I needed to do that here. To do this I had to remove the back wheel well cover. It is held on by grommets that are a pain to get out so buy some extras because you are going to break some. You can get at least half of them out buy getting under the truck and squeezing in the tabs with a pair of pliers. Here is the back side of the grommets.

Once you get the cover off you can get in some contorted positions to fortify a couple of the bolts. There is not a lot of room to reach your hand up in there so you can only reach certain points. I put 3 longer bolts with nuts on each side. The rest of the spots i just used the supplied screws. Once you get them all bolted down you now have tracks on each bed rail that you can attach things to.



And here is the completed product with one of my bikes on the back.


Let me know if you have any questions.