Trailer Hitch Installation - 2006 Pontiac Montana - Curt

Installation of a Trailer Hitch on a 2006 Pontiac Montana

Today on our 2006 Pontiac Montana well be installing the Curt Hitch part number 13344. This application does come with the manufacturers load leveling system that will need to be modified on the drivers side. Here are a couple of measurements to assist you with selecting accessories for your new hitch. From the center of the hitch pin hole to the outer most edge of the bumper is 6 inches. From the top of the receiver tube to the ground gives you 12-3/4 inches. This will assist you with selecting accessories.

Such as a draw bar, a bike rack or a cargo carrier. Now lets go ahead with the installation. To do this well remove the hardware holding it in place, one frame fastener and two here on the side. The older these vehicles get the more rusted these threads become and they have a tendency to break. If thats the case youll need to use new hardware or self-tappers to resecure the bracket.

Once we get it down and out were also going to cut off the vertical tab here that sticks up into the frame. Lets go ahead and do this now. Now Im just going to take my grinder and cut off the vertical tab. Now that weve got that completed here on the drivers side well move over to the passengers side and remove the two fasteners holding the exhaust bracket in place. Itll also be necessary here on the passenger side to remove the support hanger.

Well go ahead and remove the frame fastener and just loosen up the side fastener. This will allow us to get our hitch in place and then well re-attach it later. Now its a good idea to get a second set of hands to help you hold the hitch in place while you install your new ten-millimeter bolt and conical tooth washer into the frame walnut where were going to remove the compressor on the drivers side and the exhaust hanger on the passenger side. Now with those fasteners in place were going to go ahead and tighten them up. This will allow us to use the hitch as a template to draw out the rear most fasteners on each side.

Well start with a small pilot bit and work our way up to the half-inch final size bit.Here on the passenger side the forwardmost holes will also need to be drilled out just as we did the rearmost holes for each side. Now with all our holes drilled out were ready to go ahead and start installing our fasteners. To install the forward fastener here on the passenger side well be using our pole wire supplied with our install kit to put in place a block and half-inch carriage bolt for our forward fastener. Lets go ahead and do that now. Take our bolt layer or pull wire, go in through our techno point and right back out through the access hole then we can slide on our block and thread on our bolt. Then well take our block and slide it up into the frame, plough the bi R bolt then we can go ahead and remove the pull wire. For our rear most fasteners well be using the supplied handle nut, half inch bolt and conical tooth washer. The teeth of the washer will face the hitch and will feed the handle nut up over our drilled hole. Using the access hole in the side of the frame we can feed our handle nut in over our techno point. For our rear attachment points well just repeat the same process on the drivers side. Now well go ahead and tighten up the three fasteners we just installed. As we install the flange nut here on the forward fastener for the passenger side well install the bracket that we removed earlier first and then secure it with a half-inch flange nut. Now we can go back and remove the fasteners from the weld nuts so that we can reinstall the exhaust hanger on the passenger side and our load leveling compressor on the drivers side. Well be using all new hardware with the exception of the bracket on the passenger side. Now with the new hardware removed well go back and reinstall the load leveling compressor. With this application itll be necessary to trim a little more the low leveling bracket. So well go ahead and cut it along this line here and take a notch out there. this will allow for the new hardware and hitch. Once we get our fasteners in place we can go ahead and tighten them down and as we stated before if one of the studs breaks well need to use a new fastener. In this case were going to use a self-tapping screw to resecure the bracket. The older these compressors get the older the vacuum hoses that connect them get. As in this case where the old vacuum hose broke well need to remove that broken end off of the plastic T and then cut a clean edge on the old hose and then go ahead and reinstall it. This is clearly a temporary fix as you can see the line has become deteriorated over time and ultimately needs to be replaced but in a pinch itll get you back on the road. Now on the passenger side we can go ahead and take our new hardware and reinstall the exhaust hanger. Now well go ahead and tighten it down. And now with all our new hardware in place well go ahead and toreque to specifications as indicated in the instructions. Alright, with all our fasteners torqued to specifications that will complete the install of our car hitch part number 13344 on our 2006 Pontiac Montana.