Custom Fit Kit for Inno XS200, XS250, and INSU-K5 Roof Rack Feet

Video Transcript for Inno Aero Crossbars Roof Rack Kit Installation - 2023 Ford F-150

Hi, I'm Matt with etrailer, and today we're talking about the inner roof rack system on top of our 2023 Ford F-150. That's gonna be a great option for you if you are trying to haul anything that's longer that you maybe can't fit in the bed of your vehicle, anything like a kayak, you're gonna be able to put this on top of your roof and it's gonna work greatly, especially if you have a ladder rack that can work in conjunction with it. Another thing that's nice about it too is if you're looking for something that's gonna be a little bit more clean or have more of a flush designed to it, this is gonna be a great option for that too. So let's check it out. Our system today is gonna be comprised of three parts. The first one is gonna be our 51-inch arrow crossbars up top.

Next to that, we're gonna have our flush towers and that's gonna connect to our fit kit. So let's take a closer look at the crossbar, I mean. So this crossbar is gonna have this arrow designed to it that's gonna help it be more aerodynamic to reduce that wind noise. It's also gonna have this weatherstrip on top that's also gonna help reduce wind noise, but it's also gonna help keep debris from entering in here. The whole purpose of this weatherstrip is to help protect that T-channel we have at the top and that T-channel is gonna be used for your T-channel accessories.

And then next to that, we're gonna have the towers that it attached to. This is going to be more of a flush design. So what that means is our crossbar is gonna stick past it, it's gonna give you more of a clean design overall. And beneath that, we're gonna have our fit kit. Our fit kit's gonna be what makes us a custom fit for our vehicle today and it's gonna attach to our gutters within our vehicle and grab hold.

It really does give us a very good secure fit and the only way to access this hardware is to remove the end cap on the back of your tower, which has a lock core to it. To give you a close look at what's inside, we'll unlock this, get this out of our way. The way that fit kit operates is we're gonna have this bolt that attaches or secures down to our tower, and this clamp is gonna be in between the tower and that bolt, holding it in place. And that clamp is gonna attach to the inside of our door jam. And you can see it does cover quite a bit of a distance.

So I am a fan of that design. We're gonna get a few measurements now. The first one I'm gonna get is gonna be the clearance beneath their crossbars to our roof, and that's gonna be at about an inch of three quarters, which isn't a whole lot of space. Now if you want a little bit more space, you can go next to that if you have the chance, which is gonna give us about more like two inches of space underneath here, which is still gonna be very limiting, especially if you are trying to get those more bulky clamps on here. If you are doing that, I'd still recommend sticking to that T-channel if you can. But the overall height, we're gonna get, I'm gonna get from our tower because our tower sticks up a little bit more than our crossbar does and that's gonna be a little bit over three inches, isn't too bad. That's actually a really low profile. So what you lose out on the clearance underneath the crossbar, you gain with how height sits. What I recommend is taking the total height of your vehicle plus your crossbars, and if you have any gear on top of that, include that too so you know what errors you make it under. As for the crossbar spread, we're gonna have a specific number that is gonna work for our vehicle today that you probably can play around with it a bit, but I would still recommend sticking to what the manufacturer recommends. So I'm just gonna go from the back of our front crossbar in the back of the rear crossbar and that's gonna get us a little bit under 29 inches. So that's gonna be mounted in space. You gotta think about when you do put gear up here. You are gonna have the ability to load this up to 165 pounds, which is quite a bit. It's something I do recommend in checking what your roof is rated for on your vehicle. You can find that in your owner's manual and then going from the lowest rated component. But overall, I think this can be a great option for you, especially if you do like something that's more flush and more low profile. Now if you want something that's gonna have the crossbar stick out a little bit, Inno does make another system that does have those bars stick out a bit. That's gonna be a great option if you have any ski carriers that are kind of hard to reach, especially grabbing something right here is gonna be much easier than reaching in, and grabbing something at this point. Or if you wanna check out some of our other roof rack systems, we have plenty from Yakima and Rhino Rack, but if you're curious about the install process, just stay tuned and we'll walk you through it. To start off our installation, we're gonna lay everything out. So up front, we're gonna have our crossbar and the towers on each end, with the end caps in the center, we're gonna have our clamps and then the bases that go on our towers. We're gonna have these two adapters that go into our crossbars so you can attach your towers. We're gonna have some included tools. We're gonna have two different size Allen keys. One's gonna have this built-in torque device to let you know when it's all gonna be tightening down, and we're gonna have a set of keys. What I do recommend is grabbing a tape measure. Your kit will come out with a little tiny paper ruler. I'm not a big fan of using those. I think a regular tape measure is gonna help you out a lot more. Where I wanna start is putting on my tower to my crossbar. To do that, we need to do for a few things first. I'm gonna unlock this so I can remove the end cap. I also wanna make sure this is gonna go on the correct side. So you notice there's an L right here, letting us know it's gonna go on the left side. The end cap's also gonna have a label like that too. So we wanna make sure this goes on the left side of the bar. A good way to figure this out is to orient your bar. So this is gonna be facing forward, so you wanna make sure this thicker side is facing in front of you. Once you've done that, we know this is gonna be our left side, so I'm just gonna flip this over and start prepping the bar. To do that, I'm gonna push this channel forward without do it, I just usually put my finger here and push against it so it sticks all the way out. You're gonna have this square gap. We're gonna put our adapter, this piece right here in there and we're gonna do that through the bottom. You notice we have this notch right here and that's gonna fit perfectly into that square and lock into place and we're just gonna push this all the way back in. It is a little bit of back and forth, but you notice I can't push it in anymore. What I gotta do is press this square down, push it some so it locks in place. The reason why we have to have this all the way in, is when we place our towers on it, we're gonna have two notches that are gonna go into the adapter and that thicker side can't fit into the channel in the thinner areas. That's why we have to have it all the way back here. So I'm just gonna flip that around, line up that notch with that opening right here and place it down. I might have to change my angle just a little bit, but you'll notice it's not grabbing all the way. The fact side's not on there, so we do have to push it all the way back out until it grabs on. And from this side, from this point, I just recommend tightening this slightly so it grabs on. So we're gonna have this channel at the bottom of your tower, you're gonna grab your larger Allen key and tighten that down. Like I said, you just wanna do that just slightly enough for it to grab on so it's not fleeing it all over the place. And once you have that done, you can repeat that process on the other side. With built towers on, we can move on to putting the bases on them. So what I like to do is when I grab that base, you'll notice we have these holes, little divots on them. These are just gonna match those divots to the bolts or screws we have on here right now. And these tabs are gonna go right into those holes too. This is gonna sit on here pretty flush, so if you have any gaps, you know this isn't on there quite right. That's about what it should look like. You just do that on the other side and we have both on there. We can get the distance between the towers. Now that distance that I have today is gonna be 51 or 51 inches or 25 and a half from the center to one of the towers. So I'm just gonna double check, see what mine is. I'm a little bit short, so I'm gonna have to extend these out. So I did tighten these down all the way. So what I can just do is grab my crossbar and pull on the tower, extend that out. I'll do that on both sides and then remeasure everything. Before we get this up on a roof, the last step is just gonna be tightening those bolts, the rest of the way down. And once you do this on both sides, we can finally get it up there. Make this process a lot easier. I recommend just getting in your bed because putting it up here, like I said, it's just gonna be a lot simpler. So when you place this on top of your roof, you wanna make sure that this thicker side is facing forward and this thinner side is facing behind us. After when you've done that, we're just gonna roughly place this where we need it to sit. We're looking at around 20 inches from that door frame, but this doesn't have to be perfect quite yet. Back from when this is roughly on here, I recommend checking both sides, making sure that base is grabbing on to those gutters or that divot we have on top of our roof. When everything's looking pretty good, I recommend just making sure everything's spaced out correctly. It's gonna be the same process for both your crossbars, for your front and rear one. The only difference is gonna be the measurement you use. The measurement we're looking for at rear crossbar is gonna be 19 and three quarters. Now just make sure you go from that point right here between your two doors, measure out to the center of your crossbar and make sure everything's lined up on both sides. At your front crossbar is gonna be sitting at seven and three quarters, so just keep that in mind when you measure from that same distance. We'll make sure that these bars stay up here, so it'll help hold 'em in place, we are gonna have to put on our clamps. And before we can do that, we've gotta remove this bolt. When this bolt is removed, we just set it off to the side, we'll grab it in just a second again, but we wanna put our clamps up here, put that outta the way. You can grab that clamp and you are gonna just line it up to the contours of your tower, and you are gonna push that bolt right through there into where you got it from, and bolt it back down into place. You wanna make sure when you do this too, that this clamp is around your gutter and you're pushing on and against it towards your vehicle. With that hand-tight now, I wanna grab our included tool with that torque device on it and start tightening this down. And the best way to do this is to tighten this a little bit, going back and forth to each side so it doesn't pull too much to one side, making it uneven. But the way it's gonna let you know if it's tightened all the way is when you hear that click that we just had. Finally, our last step is just gonna be putting on our end caps. Just make sure you have the correct one for the correct side so it goes in there correctly. Sometimes they can be a little tricky to line up, but once it's flushed all around, we'll lock it in place. And this is a good point, just give it a shake test, make sure nothing's moving, everything feels pretty solid. And if it does, you can load it up with whatever gear you have, you take it out for a ride. But that was just a look at the installation and some of the features of the NL roof rack system on top of our 2023 Ford F-150. Thanks for watching.