Today, we're going to work on a 2012 Chevy Malibu. We're going to be installing the Roadmaster Base Plates, part number 523145-5. For the easy installation, we've gone ahead and jacked up the vehicle, removed the front wheels and opened the hood. Our first step is going to be removing the upper plastic piece that covers the radiator and core support. We've got some bolts to remove and plastic fasteners. I'll start with my plastic fasteners.
Using a flat-bladed screwdriver, we need to get up underneath the plastic cap and gently pry it upward. Once I get it started, I can simply take one of my trim tools and pry it up the rest of the way. Alright, there's our first one. We've got a total of four to do. Alright, now, we can go ahead and remove our bolt fasteners.
Go ahead and take the plastic cover off. Set it aside for reinstallation later. Now with that done, it exposes the upper core support and front clip that we're going to be removing. We need to go to the wheel wells and remove the plastic fasteners there. We now need to remove all the fasteners that hold the lower plastic rock shield to the front clip.
We've got both push fasteners and screw fasteners. And now that we're under the vehicle, it's also easier to get to a screw attachment up underneath the fender well. So we'll go ahead and remove that now also. And now, we'll go over to the driver's side and repeat the same process. For the easy installation, I'm going to go ahead and remove the front air dam also.
We've got two 7-millimeter bolts and three pushpins to remove. Alright, now I want to go ahead and lower the front rock shield. To do that, we have seven more pushpin fasteners we'll need to remove. After removing another pushpin fastener on the driver's side, you can see it folds down away from the body completely now. We'll go ahead and repeat that same process on the passenger's side also. Now, we need to go ahead and remove the front clip or fascia as it's referred to the instructions. To do this, we'll simply pull out on the fender working one side at a time. With the passenger's side pulled out away from the fender, I'm now going to move over the driver's side and repeat the same process. It can be helpful to have an extra set of hands to help you do this so you can pull them off evenly. With both sides pulled out of the way from the fenders, we're not going to pull up along the front fascia. There are more releases here above the headlight. With our front clip removed, we'll go ahead and set it aside for re installation later. Next, we need to remove the inner fender well cover. We need to expose the lower portion of the frame and core support. We've got a handful of fasteners that we're going to need to remove. Now, we can pull it down all the way and see we can access the bottom of the frame and at the bottom of the core support. Now, we'll go ahead and repeat the same process on the driver's side. Next, we're going to take our fish wire or bolt leader. Take our carriage bolt, thread it directly on to our bolt leader, then using our 1-3/4-inch x 3-inch block, we're going to do a reverse pull wire technique and feed it up into the access hole of the frame. So we'll go ahead and slide our pull wire through the block, feed the bolt into the frame and then our block, and then pull our bolt back down into position and remove our bolt leader. Alright, now, we'll go ahead and repeat the same process on the driver's side. Next, we're going to install our lock washer and nut onto the carriage bolt that we just installed. So its a good time to get an extra set of hands to help you hold it in place while you bolt it down. Be careful when setting your bracket in position, not to push your carriage bolt back up into the frame. Alright, with our fasteners installed on the passenger's side, I'll repeat the same process on the driver's side. And now with my front bracket in place with the two fasteners, we'll go ahead and tighten them down. Ok, with our fasteners tightened down, mark out the front holes that we'll need to drill on the front bumper core support. So using a marker, I'll make a mark in front of the bumper core support that we'll need to drill out. Now, with our holes marked out, we'll go ahead and remove the bracket so we can drill out our holes. Now, using a smaller drill as a pilot hole, we'll begin in drilling out our holes in the front bumper brace. Each hole I'll drill on the passenger's side, I'll repeat on the driver's side. With our holes drilled out, we're going to get our extra set of hands to help us put our bracket back up into the place. Now, we'll reinstall it on the passenger's side. I'll repeat the same process on the driver's side. Now with our bracket back in place, we'll go ahead and tighten it back down. We're going to go ahead and use our bolt leader or pull wire and we're going to pull our block and carriage bolt into position. So feeding my bolt leader up to our attachment point and the hole we drilled in the bumper support and out of the end of the bumper support, we'll then be able to slide on our block and thread on our carriage bolt. Now, we'll go ahead and pull them into position. Once we get our carriage bolt in position, we can go ahead and remove our bolt leader. Once we remove the bolt leader, we can go ahead and put on our lock washer and nut. Now with our front fasteners in position, we'll go ahead and tighten them down. With our front rear fasteners tightened down, we'll go ahead and torque the specifications as indicated in the instructions. With our front rear fasteners torqued to specification, we're now going to move on to drilling out our holes for the side or upright fasteners, but first, I'm going to go ahead and take my half-inch bit and make a centering mark so we can use a pilot bit to start our hole. Now, using my smaller bit, I'll go ahead and make my pilot hole. Stepping up to a larger size bit but not quite to my half inch, we'll just enlarge our hole. With our hole showed out, we can go ahead and take our 1/2-inch x 1-1/2-inch bracket and bolts and we'll feed our bolts to the bracket for installation of one of our fasteners. We just want to add a dab of red lock tight. This will help ensure that our fasteners will not come loose. And on the inside, I'm going to install our lock washers and nut. With our side fasteners in place, we'll go ahead and tighten them down and towards the specifications as indicated in the instructions. Next, we're going to ahead and mark out what we need to take out of the inner fender well. With my line marked out for the inner fender, we'll go ahead and remove this piece to compensate for the brackets so we can reinstall the inner fender well lining. There at the driver's side I'll repeat the same process for the passenger's side. With our cut-outs made, we'll go ahead and put our inner fender well lining back in place. Now, we'll take our front fascia and measure out what we need to take out or cut out so our base plate is able to fit through the front fascia. With our cut-outs made, we'll go ahead and install our front fascia. Now that our front fascia is reinstalled, we'll go ahead and reinstall the under body panels and all of our fasteners in the wheel wells. With all our fasteners reinstalled, we'll go ahead and reinstall the front tires. And that will complete our install of our Roadmaster Base Plate, part number 523145-5, on our 2012 Chevrolet Malibu.
Base Plate Wiring Harness Installation - 2012 Chevrolet Malibu
Today in this 2012 Chevy Malibu, well be using a 6-Pole Round Pin Connector, part number PK11609 and Diode Kit, part number 38955. Were going to install our 6-Pole Connector here in this space, so first Ill need to remove the lower panels so I can start routing my wire. When routing our wire, we're going to be careful to stay away from pinch points such as the suspension or steering, or extensive heat such as exhaust. Im going to use a piece of air line or pull wire to help me thread it through the frame here of the vehicle. We got our wire run to the back of the vehicle, now we need to get up into the trunk area so that we can attach it to the manufacturers wiring. To do that, were going to need to pull apart some of the rear interior.
Roadmaster Base Plate Installation - 2007 Chevrolet Malibu
Today on this 2007 Chevrolet Malibu we are going to install part number 523120-1 from Roadmaster, the EZ Base Plate Kit. The first thing we need to do is open up the hood and get some fasteners so we can take off the front bumper cover. There will be some fasteners on the top and the bottom. With the rivets we just have to unscrew the top part of them and we will pop up the bottom half. When it does not unscrew very easily, pull up on the plastic a little to bind it up and that might help back out the screw. Now we are underneath the vehicle starting over on the driver side. We are going to take out these 7 millimeter fasteners and work our way all the way around the edge of the bumper. There is also four plastic rivets we need to remove along the way too. Lets remove this plastic part here with these two rivets and then we will go back to the original rivets we were going to take out before. Now that you can see the plastic rivets remove these four too. Next we are going to remove these two little panels right here, these little rivets and that will give us a more room to take off the bumper cover easier. 01:38
