DIY Roof Rack mounting?

Made a DIY Prinsu rack. I am not a fan of how the Prinsu rack look on a 1st gen so i made my own that fits the body lines. The windscreen is not pictured as i havent finished it yet. Hoping tacoma world can help me brainstorm some ideas?

 

How will you mount it? Prinsu has "feet" bent into the design for mounting. I was thinking of building something like this for a rack for my topper.

 

Yeah, i dont have the ability to bend aluminium tabs off the main plate like that. I am thinking ill use some right angle and drill through the roof. But i figured id post here and see if someone had a better idea

 

Have you looked at the website 8020.net ?

EVERYTHING you need or want to make a roof rack, and lots of mounts too. Maybe you can find something there?

 

its made of 8020 my guy....

 

You can bend it, alum. Is soft enough if you when with 5052. Just heat it up and stick it in a vise and bend it.... take your time...

 

6061. I tried with a scrap piece and it broke.

 

im thinking something like this

https://www.tacomaworld.com/threads/custom-roof-rack.472381/

 

I did four of these on my shell I can pretty much tie down anything I need

 

Queen mattress and box spring no problem!

 

@wolfgang123 did you ever come up with a mounting solution for your rack?

I'm planning on making a similar rack in the future and I was thinking about installing Yakima Tracks (or equivalent) into the cab roof. That way if I ever needed to remove the rack, I wouldn't have to worry about sealing the holes.
You can get the toprac mounting feet from Prinsu to mount yours, they bolt onto the bottom of the crossbars. You'd still need to make some shims or something to deal with the curvature of the roof.

My only concern with doing something like this is the bendability of the Yakima tracks. I know they are pretty flexible, but it would take some fine tuning to get the to match the "hump" of the ext cab roof.

Edit: I also plan on doing something like this to reinforce the roof
https://www.livingoverland.com/2012/02/reinforcing-roof.html

 

I made one too for my 3rd gen. If I can figure out a way to mount one on my 1st gen, I'd do the same.