MountainTop Roll Cover review
The CarAdvice Mitsubishi Triton receives a security boost
How do you make a 4x4 ute more versatile? That huge space in the back is awesome, yes. But when it gets wet, isn’t lockable, and anybody can just straight-up jump in the back, is that rear end really that usable in the real world?
We had this problem with our hard-working crew vehicle, a Mitsubishi Triton GLX+. One solution is fitting up a canopy to your tub, which lets you secure stuff out of the weather. You lose that practicality of a tub however; your ute just turned into a kind of split-in-half wagon with no rear seats.
We didn’t want to go down the canopy road, wanted to try something different, so we’ve installed a MountainTop Roll cover. We aren’t a complete stranger to these, using them most notably on Ford Ranger Wildtrak models. But, what are they like on a vehicle you own in the long term?
The CarAdvice Triton is a 2016 model, and spends most of its life anywhere from the city centre to out in the bush hauling the camera crew, and all of their gear on photo and video shoots.
While a 4x4 ute is the default jack-of-all choice for this kind of work, having previously only had a soft tonneau cover as protection for cargo left a lot of sweaty palms and furrowed brows every time we stepped away from the vehicle.
Is the tub now waterproof? In a decent down pouring of rain, yes it is. Water gets channeled away to drains, and it works well enough to keep the tub (and its contents) dry. The soft tonneau did a decent job of this as well, to be honest. But a roller drawer is significantly easier to deploy and remove.
Is it 100 per cent secure? Probably not; a well-placed crowbar or something like that could get past the roller top. I haven’t tried, because I don’t want to damage the thing. But if someone brazen enough was keen enough… you get the idea. But at least, the tub is now much more secure than it was with the basic tonneau cover.
The tailgate is now lockable as well, which it wasn’t previously. This works with a little tongue that pops down from the roller cover, and locks onto a bracket installed on the tailgate. Ours needed adjustment to get the right fit, because there isn’t a stack of tolerance on the install. But once right, it works well.
When rolled away, your tub functions just as normal. The roller top sits right at the back of the tub, sitting high and leaving useable space below it. To a large degree, it takes up mostly dead space. This is important, because you can use your tub just like a normal tub, if you need it.
What I like most about it is the speed and ease at which the roller deploys. It’s much easier than any tonneau cover I’ve come across, and locking up the tailgate is a bonus.
Prices for the Mountain TopRoll Cover starts at $1,995 for a silver model. You can option up some additional accessories, like cargo carriers ($249) and SportsBar adapter kits ($179).
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