2014-2018 Mazda 3 Roof Rack Cross Bars Silver

I too only gave it four stars. The only reason being, you have to remove the entire rack screws and plastic bits completely to take your car through an automated carwash. For some reason (keys) I thought you could remove just the rails and not the bases like every other roof rack I have ever owned. It's quite an inconvenience if you wash your car a lot.

Very good items and fast shipping

5 stars for price, 3 stars for quality of materials. You get what you pay for.

I am not at all mechanically inclined and even small projects like this intimidate me. Yet, I was able to successfully install the rack on my 2016 Mazda3 hatchback without help in about 2 hours. For those of you who can relate to my limited mechanical ability, here’s what I did:
Like others I chose to discard the directions after I checked to see if all the parts were in the box.
I then cleaned and dried the entire top of my car and placed a bath towel across the top of the car to accept the various tools and pieces.
I chose to drill my existing ditch moldings and reuse them.
To remove the ditch moldings I used a flathead screwdriver with the tip wrapped in electrical tape (so as not to scratch the paint on the car).
I began by removing the front clip by carefully rotating the tip of the screwdriver back and forth until the clip popped off the front T post. That said, I still slightly damaged the plastic clip.
I then worked slowly along the roofline disengaging two middle clips and finally the rear T post.
I carefully lined up the freed ditch molding with the anchor points and marked the places for the holes.
I used a 1/4 inch metal bit to drill two holes through the rubber and the galvanized steel of the ditch molding.
I replaced the ditch molding by first engaging the front T-post and then the second middle clip, then the back T-post, and finally the first middle clip. There are three pesky rubber pads that freely slip and slid along the ditch molding. As I was reinstalling the drilled molding, I marked the places where the pads go and made sure they were positioned correctly before I snapped the molding down.
I made sure the front weather stripping lay perpendicular on top of the ditch molding.
I repeated everything with the second ditch molding except I did not properly center one of the drilled holes so I had to use a rat tail file to enlarge one side of the misaligned hole.
I checked to see if all four anchor bolts would thread into the anchor points and then removed them. (This is how I found the misaligned hole and had to remove the ditch molding again to correct it.)
I dry fitted the left and right legs onto one aluminum cross bar and set them onto the foot pads. I discovered this entire assembly was way too short to span the roof! That’s when I discovered the ditch moldings are not parallel. The front anchor points are about two inches farther apart than the rear anchor points. And the two aluminum cross bars are different lengths! The long cross bar obviously goes on the front. (You can probably guess where I first tried to place it.) Anyway, both dry fit assemblies were far too short to span the roof with one longer than the other.
I placed an anchor bolt through the left leg and foot pad of the longer assembly and threaded it firmly into the anchor point, but I did not tighten it.
The pulled the corresponding right leg partially to the right thus making it slide out from the bar until it was positioned over the right anchor point. I threaded the bolt firmly but not tight.
I slid the bar to the right until the bar was perfectly centered as indicated by the half centimeter markings on the top of the left and right plastic legs. Each end of the bar was at the 1.5 centimeter mark.
I repeated everything for the rear bar and found that the perfect center was at the 3.5 centimeter mark due to the much shorter bar.
I alternately tightened the anchor bolts all around and tightened the four bolts parallel to the bars. I guessed those are to arrest the left/right play in the cross bars.
I slipped on the plastic covers (much easier said than done!) and locked them down.
I lashed a 35 pound kayak directly to the bars and drove 20 miles at high speed. No problem.

I think the ideal lengths of the bars should be such that their ends appear at the 0.5 centimeter mark. That way the bars are inserted into the plastic legs to nearly a maximum distance giving the rack maximum stability. The manufacturer probably cut the bars to make them fit a variety of vehicles. I would prefer to receive bars that are too long and cut them to the proper length.

Fit perfect

So far, so good. BE WARNED... If your roof gutter/ditch mouldings do not have access ports, you WILL need to either drill holes or purchase new mouldings with access ports for the roof rail anchors (not expensive - about $14 - 25 USD). And fellas, listen to the ladies when they tell you that this is what other people did. They're not lying. And it'll save you a fight.