Trunx Roof Box Review - 2013 Volkswagen Jetta

Products Featured in this Video

Trunx Rooftop Cargo Carrier - 9 cu ft - Black

145 reviews

Code: TRX44FR

Price:  $255.59

• Roof Box
• Aero Bars
• Elliptical Bars
• Factory Bars
• Round Bars
• Square Bars
• Extra Short Length

• High Profile
• Extra Small Capacity
• Passenger Side Access
• Black
• Trunx

46-5/8 x 27-3/8 x 17-5/16. Roof box mounts to crossbars with U-bolts and hand knobs. Locking lid opens from the side. Carries camping gear, sports equipment, and other cargo on small to mid-size vehicles. Durable, HDPE thermoplastic construction.

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Review of the Trunx Roof Box on a 2013 Volkswagen Jetta

Zach: Hey everybody, Zach here at etrailer.com. Today, we're going to be taking a look at the Trunx nine cubic foot rooftop cargo box on our 2013 Volkswagen Jetta. It's going to be a really nice, easy to use cargo box. I like that it's a more cost effective option, if you're looking to get a little bit more protection on top of your roof, versus something like a cargo basket, or a hitch-mounted cargo carrier. But it's going to lack a few features of some of the higher end ones, but I was actually pleasantly surprised when I took this one out. I hit some rain, and didn't have any issues with it.It's pretty easy to install.

I've got part of it installed already. So I'm going to pop this lid up, and I'm going to support it with these arms here. So that's one thing that this one's lacking, is it can't support itself whenever we're getting our items out of this. And it's held in place with a similar concept of most rooftop cargo boxes, and that's just a piece that goes around the bottom side of our crossbars here. Now, one thing with this one, is this one, I had to drill holes.

So it has a minimum crossbar spread of about 22" when it's out of the box, and that's really for roof racks that allow you to adjust them.Now, with the Volkswagen Jetta, specifically the sedan, it's going to be fixed mounted. Now, if you have the sport wagon and you have the raised roof rack, you can move those styles along the raised roof rail, but this one's about 28 1/2". So I had to drill a couple holes, that's a very normal thing to do with this. If you had your crossbars 30" or more, this won't work out for you, but there are definitely other options out there. But once you get that in place, we're going to set this inside the cargo box, right over the bolts there, and then we're going to follow it up with these nuts.

So we'll get that tightened down, and this holds our box in place.Now, a lot of higher end boxes will have a clamp system where you just pull up on a lever. They're a little bit quicker to use, but I don't think tightening these down adds that much more time, and I was actually pretty surprised with how well it did. I took this home for an evening, altogether, I put probably a hundred, 110 miles on it at highway speed. I drove through a couple of rainstorms, and it kept stuff dry, it wasn't too noisy. It actually didn't really knock down my fuel economy, maybe a mile per gallon or two, but that's not as bad as some other ones.

I've had larger roof boxes on my cars before, and it's knocked it down like five or six miles per gallon. So I was kind of expecting this one to be a little bit more noisier, and knocking the fuel economy down quite a bit, because it's not as sleek and aerodynamic as some of those other brands, but I was pretty surprised with it.But when we get that tightened down, we can get a closer look in here at how much space we have. So this is only nine cubic feet, and I think it's a good amount for the Jetta here. I was able to get a couple carry-on cargo bags in here. Excuse me, carry-on suitcases, and then I was able to get a couple other small little things in here. So this isn't something you're going to be able to fit like skis and snowboards in here, like a lot of roof boxes. I forgot to tighten these down back here. If you have some bigger suitcases, something that I like to take on my trips, I have a larger roof box, personally. I have a 16 cubic foot one, and I can't fit my stroller in that one, because it's too low profile. You're definitely not going to be able to fit some of the bigger jogging strollers in here. If you had a smaller, more travel sized one, you could fit it in here, but you can still get some camping gear, a couple of duffle bags in place.What we're going to do now is we're going to close this up, rest those in place. So overall, really what we're losing, is some of the ease of use features. Other ones just kind of latch down in place. You've got to get to go around and get these latched down, which is not that big of a deal, really. It makes sure that it's secure. There's one on each side, so we've got three total, and then we have these locks here. So then when we get this locked up, you kind of got to make sure that it lines up properly. Sometimes you got to move that a little bit. See, that one didn't line up. So this is the things that I'm talking about when we're kind of losing some of the ease of use features, but it's something that is okay when you're talking about just using it once or twice a year. So if you're only going on a trip every once in a while, and we're not using this all the time, we're not needing to get in all the time on that trip, it's not that big of a deal.And we have these little clips to make sure that those don't come undone when we're going down the road. I don't think that they would anyway, but it just adds a little bit more security to it. I've already got the driver's side in place. One of the other things, if you're comparing this to other roof boxes, is some of them allow you to open up on the driver and passenger side. That's a nice feature if you've got a really big one that takes up the whole roof. This does a decent job of taking up most of the roof. Mine opens up on both sides, but I find myself always scooting it to the passenger side. I'm always getting in the passenger side, because if I have street parking, I'm not getting into that box whenever I'm sitting out in the street like that. So I don't think it's the end of the world that I can only open this up on one side. We're losing some of those ease of use features. I don't think it's that big of a deal.Like I said, very surprised that this kept water out. The rain storms I drove through, they we're pretty significant. I mean, they weren't anything major by any means, but it kept all my stuff dry, fuel economy didn't go down any. So I think overall, this is a really good roof box, whether you're looking to use it just once a year for a family trip, or you're wanting to use it often, that's where this ease of use stuff comes in. If you're using it all the time, maybe look at a different box, but it's still going to be a really good one for you. But that's going to do it for our look at the Trunx rooftop cargo box, on our 2013 Volkswagen Jetta.