Trailer Hitch Installation - 2010 Ford Taurus

Installation of a Trailer Hitch on a 2010 Ford Taurus

Today on this 2010 Ford Taurus we will be installing Hidden Hitch part number 87565 and this installation will also apply for Draw-Tite part number 75670. The first thing we want to do in preparation to installing our trailer hitch is to lower the exhaust down off the driver side frame rail. We have got two hangers that we want to remove to help lower the exhaust out of the way. The first one being at the rear of the vehicle nearest the bumper and then if we follow forward almost even with the axle there is a second one. To ease in the removal of these rubber hangers we are going to spray the studs down with a spray lubricant like a WD-40. Then we can take either a pry bar or a set of pliers and separate the two pieces. 00:40

Before I remove the exhaust off its second hanger I do want to put a support strap around the exhaust tube and then I am going to find two attaching holes underneath. The reason being is that once we remove the exhaust off those two rear most hangers the exhaust could come down. We will come back to the rear most hanger and lower the exhaust off it. Then with the exhaust lowered, we can see if we look on the forward side of the driver side frame rail we have got an existing hole that is going to provide our frame mounted attaching point over on the driver side. If we continue over to the passenger side frame rail we are going to be using a similar hole on this frame rail as well. 01:15

Take and look at the bumper from underneath the vehicle. You can see we have got two bumper pods, one here and one here, that have fascia straps going on to them. So we first want to move the fascia straps from these pods. To do that you can take a fastener removal tool like I have got. Feed that in behind the fascia strap and that will allow it to release. Fold that out of the way for the time being and do the same thing on the other one as well. We do want to hang on to those fasteners because we will be reinstalling them once the hitch is up in place. We are going to be enlarging the innermost oblong hole on each one of these bumper pods and you want to enlarge those to 1/ 2 inch. With the holes enlarged in the bumper pods we can go back to the frame rails and we can fish wire our carriage bolts and blocks inside the frame. To accomplish this we are going to be using the 1/ 2 inch bolt leader that is provided with our installation kit. 02:08

We want to take the curled end and feed it through the bottom of the attaching hole, feed it out through our access hole at the end of the frame rail. Insert the block on to the bolt leader followed by the carriage bolt which will wrap the threads of the bolt leader around the threads of the carriage bolt and feed it inside the frame. Take the other bolt leader and pull it down into place. We want to do the same thing on the driver side and then we will hang our hitch up into position using these carriage bolts. On the driver side we want to make sure we go up and over the exhaust and we are going to be installing the hitch using 1/ 2 inch conical tooth washers and hex nuts. If you are having trouble getting the holes to align the hitch and the holes in the bumper pod that you drilled it may not be a bad idea to hold the hitch up in position and take the drill bit again, run it through both and that is going to insure that they align for you. You also want to note that when you are going to make the attachments to the bumper pods you want to make sure that the frame bolts are all the way backed off like I have right here. Otherwise you will not have the proper angle and the hitch will not want to meet up with the bottom of the bumper pods. 03:21

Next we will go to the holes that we drilled in the bumper pods. What we are going to be doing is taking the handle nuts that were provided with the installation kit and we are going to feed it through the cut out on the outboard side of the pod. It is basically going to lay inside the pod and it is going to provide our attaching points for our hex bolts from the bottom of the hitch itself. We want to start tightening them down. I am going to hand tighten each of the bolts and then we will go back through and torque them down to their specified torque ratings. We just want to repeat that for the other pod as well. When torquing the bolts down I would recommend torquing the bolts on the bumper pods first and then we will move to the ones on the frame. With all the bolts torqued down we just want to put the exhaust back up on its hangers. We also want to make sure we put the fascia straps back up, attach to the bumper pods and our installation will be completed. With that, that will conclude the installation of Hidden Hitch part number 87565 on a 2010 Ford Taurus. We can give you a couple of final dimensions. From the top of the receiver tube opening to the ground is going to be 12-1/ 2 inches and then from the center of the pin hole out to the clear rear of the edge of the bumper is going to be right around 6-1/ 2 inches.