These mounts let you install your Kuat Grip on your roof rack crossbars with T-channels. Includes 2 high-profile mounts for roof clearance for skis and snowboards with tall bindings and 2 low-profile mounts for better aerodynamic performance.
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Videos are provided as a guide only. Refer to manufacturer installation instructions and specs for complete information.
Hi everyone, Aidan here with etrailer. Today we're gonna be taking a look at the direct mount kit for your Kuat Grip ski and snowboard carriers. What this is gonna do is replace the wraparound clamps and allow you to mount it in your T-track on your roof rack. This gives a much cleaner look and a much more sturdy install on the crossbars, let's check 'em out. So there's two options that come with this kit. The one we have installed right now is the high profile mount, which actually extends this up a bit.
What this allows for is if you have some larger bindings depending on your roof rack obviously, you will be able to mount your skis and snowboards upside down with less binding clearance on your roof. Again, that really comes down to what your roof rack is and how much clearance it gives you from your roof as well as how large your bindings are. You can see in our case, we have just enough room with ours to mount it upside down, saving us some height overall. A more exact measurement of that is gonna be adding about 1 3/4", and that's measuring from the top of the crossbar to the bottom of the Grip with that high profile mount installed. And the other option you have with your kit is the low profile mount.
This one is only gonna be sticking up an extra 1/2" from the top of the crossbars so it is a lot more low profile. Well, one thing to consider with that is that if you do have gear loaded up, more than likely you won't be able to flip your bindings upside down. But whenever things are unloaded it is going to be a lot shorter, less height added to the vehicle and look a lot more sleek and aerodynamic while still offering the same benefits of that mounting security. Personally, I think with a roof rack like this that is very low profile and doesn't add a lot of height to the vehicle I'd go with the high profile mount just to give us that extra clearance of the bindings. But depending on the roof rack you have, a lot of those do give tons of room from the roof of your vehicle.
In those cases, I'd go with the low profile mount and you might still have clearance for the bindings. It really comes down to what your gear is, what your roof rack is, and how it's gonna interact with the ski and snowboard carrier. Regardless of which one you choose to go with, they're gonna install the same way and because of the way they install I think it's gonna be something that you set up and probably leave set up and not be something that you swap out between the different mounts. Well, let's go ahead and check out that install process now. Swapping over to the direct mount kit is really straightforward.
We're gonna start by taking off the clamps that comes standard on the Kuat Grip, opening up the Grip and finding our first bolt on the inside right there. We'll use our included tool to remove it and remove the clamp. I'm just gonna give it a little bit of lift, so when it's unthreaded it will just fall down like that and we can pop that old bolt out. Next up, we've got to pick whether we want the high mount or the low profile mount. The high mount is gonna be good for giving us clearance with our bindings and we're gonna be using these today but they both install the same way and will come with their own hardware. The longer one for the high profile and the lower one for the low profile. So these will just mount underneath and if I give it a tilt you'll see that we've got the main hole and two side holes right there that will line up with these studs and tabs on the mount. So I'm just gonna line those up give it a push and it should click in place. Just like that. Then we can take our new hardware, feed it through the top hole. We'll see it poke out the other side right here and I'll just loosely thread in the adapter for our T-track and move on to the next one. The next one, we need to slide the tray for our Grip out and we can see that bolt right there. The process is gonna be the exact same as it was before. Only this time we just have to open that tray to get to it. The tool doesn't fit super well in there because the top part of the Grip does hit it a bit. So once you've got it broken loose, just remove it by hand. It's a lot easier that way. And then this washer will freely move around. So hang onto it and make sure you reinstall it. With that in place, we can grab our long bolt, the washer we set aside, drop it down through and loosely thread in the adapter. With everything loosely installed, we can take this up to the roof. So for every roof rack it'll be a little bit different. On our Rhino-Rack roof rack today we had to completely remove the weather stripping to expose the T-track, whereas some you can just push it down. Now once you've got it in place, you can open it back up, grab the tool we used before and fully tighten down those bolts. Once everything's tightened down, you can give it the good old fashioned shake test. And one thing I really like about this compared to the actual clamp around method is that it is a lot more secure and it's less bulky too. Whether you go with those high profile mounts or the low profile ones, the installation's the exact same and you get a nice secure mounting. But that'll do it for our look at this direct mount adapter kit for your Kuat Grip ski and snowboard carrier. Thanks for watching.
Average Customer Rating: 4.8 out of 5 stars (4 Customer Reviews)
These mounts let you install your Kuat Grip on your roof rack crossbars with T-channels. Includes 2 high-profile mounts for roof clearance for skis and snowboards with tall bindings and 2 low-profile mounts for better aerodynamic performance.The Kuat rack and mounts are amazing, I have two sets for both of my SUVs. The etrailer service was excellent as well, I will keep ordering from them.
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