Last year I busted the tip off a Shimano Trevala in the tailgate, dumb but it happened. For those of you who don't kayak fish the Pacific Area the Trevala is Kayaker favorite rod in a 7 foot Medium Light. Good price, handles rock fish, salmon, smaller halibut, and I have heard of them being used for other things. Well after that I swore I would get a rod rack for my truck. Well in January I bought a left over 2020 Frontier, the old truck was pushing 25 years old, and had a horrible worn drivers seat. I took the old Gen 1 Thule X-sporter kayak rack system and crossed it over to the Nissan. No issues. It was then I noticed that there is a T-track on the underside of the cross bars. While in a local Marine shop I came across a set of DuBro 6 rod holder rack. $30 dollars, so I bought it. Hardware was tricky, common six sided bolts would not work, I ended up ordering Thule's own T-bolts, worked but pricey at $5 each and I needed 8 of them. Some small diameter SS wire and I was off to the races.
The width was to wide so I cut from 24 inches down to 20. This meant I was giving up two holders, no big deal as I never carry that many. I wanted security, but the set didn't come with anything, so I drilled some holes in each of the butt end holders so I could pass an 18" SS cable through it, I made a loop, crimped it, then slid a heat shrink tube over , then made a second loop and crimped that. I can now lock a reel to the holder. Is it going to stop a hard core thief, no not really, will it keep a meth head from stealing a rod while I pay for gas or eat lunch? I hope so! Lastly the clearance from the rod tip to the truck roof is not much, so I see a section of pool noodle being used to keep it from slapping the roof.
Ive never seen that type rod holder.
My good friend came fishing with his son and brought 3 rods. Son opened truck rear canopy door on all threes tips, end of fishing for the day.
Happens to many, don't worry.
They say more rods are broken by doors than by fish.
Any reason why you didn't put the tips out towards the tailgate? I use ski racks on drilled into my similar style Rola rack and they are narrow enough that I can put my kayak next to them. I lucked out bc I had the ski racks from 2002 and actually found the keys to the locks!
Quote from: oc1 on July 01, 2021, 02:39:06 AM
They say more rods are broken by doors than by fish.
Maybe depends on the type of fishing you do.
Here I guess amongst the guys 20 rods are broken every season because we lift/throw fish from the sea on to a rocky ledge about 6 ft above the ocean. If the angler does not know how to do this then it often ends up in tears.
I think I know how...... but over the last 25 years I have broken probably 15 myself.
Oh and small boats cause more breakages because they are too short to put a fish in to the boat with a rod, resulting in high sticking.