Trailer Hitch Installation - 2007 Chevrolet Malibu

How to Install a Trailer Hitch on a 2007 Chevrolet Malibu

Today we are going to be installing hitch part number 36317 from Draw-Tite on a 2007 Chevrolet Malibu LT. So we are going to start by lowering the exhaust down and then removing the four bolts from the end of the frame. We just want to basically pry the rubber hangers off of the studs here. To ease in the removal, we are going to go ahead and spray it down with a spray lubricant like a WD-40 . It makes the removal of the rubber hanger a lot easier. Before I remove the exhaust off its final hangers, I am going to go ahead and put a support strap on the exhaust tube here to keep it from falling once we remove all the hangers. The exhaust could fall too far down and that could possibly damage it. I am just using a basic tow strap you can use a bungee cord, as well.

We are underneath the vehicle now and we are taking a look at the passengers side frame rail. We are going to point out the mounting locations for the trailer hitch. There are going to be four vertical bolts that we are going to attach to these flanges here at the end of the frame - two per side. You see we have got one inboard rear bolt, and on the outboard side there are two. We are just going to be using the bottom one. We are going to need to remove this hardware and actually enlarge these holes to 3/8 to put the new hardware in from the installation kit. And you can see here on the rear side of the flange on the inboard side we have got just a regular hex head. On the outboard side we have got what they call a handle nut.

So, in order to get that one out of there, once we have removed the nut on the other side, we are actually going to need to cut about this much off of this flange here and then just spin it back out. That is going to be necessary on both sides of the vehicle. Like I said before, if you find that you have a locking clip around this bolt on the inside, you may need to cut this tab off and then just spin it around in order to get the bolt out. This one actually does not have that, so I can remove it freely without any problems. When we remove the inboard-side bolt, you are going to need to remove it from the rear side, because this is actually a weld nut here. So once we get the bolt out, we are actually going to need to knock this weld nut off before we can enlarge the hole. You can use a chisel or a grinding wheel to do that. And then repeat for the other side.

OK, now that I have got all the bolts removed and the weld nut removed on the inboard side, I am going to go ahead and drill the existing holes out to 3/8, and I am going to do that in all four locations. OK, and I am going to do the same for the other two holes as well. OK, with the holes drilled out, I am going to go ahead and fish the carriage bolt and large block up into the frame. Just take - feed the bolt leader through the block. Take the carriage bolt, and wrap the bolt leader around the threads of the carriage bolt. Feed the carriage bolt first up into the frame, followed by the block, and then just pull that back down into position. We just want to do that for the other side as well, and then we can go ahead and put the hitch up into position, which we will start by hanging it by these bolts first.

And then we will put these bolts in the flange next. We want to attach the carriage bolt with a conical-tooth washer and nut. And next we are going to take the 3/8 carriage bolt and 3/8 block and we are going to merge those two together and slide them into the channel at the rear side of the holes that we drilled out and feed them through the hole in the hitch. And again, we are going to attach those with the conical-tooth washer and nut. OK, we just want to get those hand tightened for the time being. And once we have got them all hand tightened we can go ahead and torque the bolts down. OK, and now that we have got all the bolts torqued down, we just want to make sure that we put our exhaust back up into place, and our installation will be complete. This will conclude the installation of hitch part number 36317 on a 2007 Chevrolet Malibu.