Trailer Hitch Installation - 2011 Toyota Camry - Hidden Hitch

Installation of a Trailer Hitch on a 2011 Toyota Camry

Today on our 2011 Toyota Camry, we'll be installing Hidden Hitch, part number 90152. Now before we begin our installation, here are a few measurements to help you in selecting accessories such as a cargo carrier or a bike rack. From the center of the hitch pin hole to the outermost part of the bumper is 4-1/2 inches and from the top of the receiver tube to the ground is 10-1/4 inches. Now, we'll go ahead with our install. Now to begin our installation, we'll go ahead and remove the spare tire and all the components from the inside the trunk. We'll next need to lower the vehicle exhaust.

We'll need to remove the rubber exhaust insulators. On the passenger's side muffler, we have three insulators, two towards the back of the vehicle and one towards the front of the muffler. On the driver's side, we have two on the rear of the vehicle and moving towards the front of the vehicle here at the Y is our last attachment. We'll also be using a strap to help us hold the exhaust in place without the damaging it. To remove the rubber isolators, we'll be using a hanger removal tool.

With the isolators removed, we'll slowly lower the exhaust out of the way. We'll now need to remove the plastic undercovering located under the trunk pan here. You'll have four screws and five nuts to remove that plastic panel. Now that we've undone the plastic tray, we can go ahead and set it aside as it will not be reinstalled on the vehicle. We can also remove the two fascia rivets holding the fascia tabs between the trunk pan of the vehicle and the rear fascia.

We'll now need to remove the existing bracket here on the driver's side. There are three bolts holding this bracket in position. Now, we'll go ahead and put the bracket and the three bolts aside as we will not be reinstalling them on the vehicle. We're now ready to go ahead and locate our mounting points. On the passenger's side here, you'll see these two holes and on the driver's side we'll be using the two weld nuts where the bracket was mounted.

We're ready to put our hitch up in place. It would be a good idea to get an extra set of hands to help you hold the hitch while you install it. Now on the passenger's side when we put our hardware into place, we'll need to use the nut and 7/16 washer on the back side to hold it in place. We'll do that for both passenger's side fasteners. On the driver's side, there are two existing weld nuts so we will not need the washer or the nut for it. When installing our hardware, we want to make sure that the conical toothed washer has the teeth facing the hitch. With all four fasteners in place here, we can go ahead and tighten them down. With them tight, we're now ready to drill our holes in the trunk pan for our last two fasteners. We'll go ahead and use a step-drill bit procedure. We'll start with a small bit and work our way up to the 1/2-inch bit, making the 1/2-inch hole in the pan using the hitch as a template. With that done, we'll go back up into the trunk and we'll need to remove the foam rubber material away from the inside surface of the trunk pan around the holes so that the spacer block sits flushed. With that done, we can go back underneath the vehicle where we'll use the remaining two spacer blocks to put between the hitch and the trunk pan itself. With the spacer blocks in place, we can go ahead and drop our hex bolt down through the hole in the trunk. Underneath the vehicle, we'll use the lock washer and the hex nut to secure our hardware. With all our hardware in place, we can go ahead and tighten it down and finish by torquing it to specification as indicated in the instructions. And now that we have all our hardware torqued to specification, we can go ahead and reinstall our exhaust, which will complete our installation of Hidden Hitch, part number 90152 on our 2011 Toyota Camry.