Fifth Wheel Hitch Installation - 2015 Ram 3500

Products Featured in this Video

B&W Companion OEM 5th Wheel Hitch for Ram Towing Prep Package - Dual Jaw - 25,000 lbs

3525 reviews

Code: BWRVK3600

Retail: $2,481.00

Price:  $1,399.00

• Fifth Wheel Hitch
• Fixed Fifth Wheel
• OEM - Ram
• 6500 lbs Vertical Load
• 25000 lbs GTW

• Double Pivot
• Standard - Double Jaw
• 17 - 19 Inch Tall
• B and W

Specially designed to attach to the receivers in your factory 5th-wheel towing prep package, the Companion OEM features a dual jaw for excellent jaw-to-king-pin contact and a cam-action handle for simple release. Easily remove for full bed access.

Do you have a question about part BWRVK3600?more information >     

How to Install a Fifth Wheel Hitch on a 2015 Ram 3500

Today on our 2015 Ram 3500 Heavy Duty Crew Cab we're going to be installing the B&W Companion OEM 5th Wheel Hitch for Ram Towing Prep Package vehicles, rated for 25,000 pounds, part number BWRVK3600. There's a handle on each side that has the black rubber piece on it. As you lift up, that's what releases it so that when you set it down on, it catches and locks it in place. You'll then need to take the pin, go back through, put your clip in. You need to do that for both sides. Now the head can pivot forward and backwards. Now that we have the head attached, to release the jaws so that you can hook up your camper or trailer, you remove the pin.

As you swing the arm open, opens up the jaws. As you back up to your camper it'll close around it. Before driving off, you'll need to make sure you put the pin back in place as well as the clip. Now the arm cannot be opened up and the jaws will stay closed. You'll notice that there's a total of five rubber plus in the bed of this vehicle. It does have the tow prep package installed from the factory.

We won't be using this center plug but we're using these four outer plugs, the one in each corner. You just simply turn the center plastic piece here. Sometimes they can be a little difficult to get out. Just a small flat head screwdriver along the edge will help you get them started. Once you have it in the open position, it just has these three little tabs that twist into place.

You're going to need to remove all four of these, one from each corner, before we can install the base of our companion hitch. We've gone ahead and set our base here on our tailgate area. Before we get it up into position, let's go ahead and go over a couple items here. Let's show you how the actual latch mechanism works that secures this base here to the bed of your vehicle. You need to pull the pin here. You slide the end off.

Remove the pin. I'm just going to lift up gently so you can see. You see this piece right here, currently it's turned in the locked position. In order for you to put the base in, you need to turn the handles like this so that they're going straight across, so that they line up with the slots in each of those four pockets that we just opened up. There's also some adjustments depending on your vehicle you may or may not need to do. This castle nut here is held in by a cotter pin and depending on if there's too much movement or that if it's too tight and you can't close the handle back down, you'll need to remove the cotter pin and adjust the castle nut either up or down depending on if it's too loose or too tight. You may not need to adjust any of them, or you may need to adjust all four. It'll be vehicle-dependent once you get it in place. We'll go ahead and remove all four of the pins and open up all four of the latch mechanisms. One way to make sure that you're putting the base in correctly, one, it says B&W on the backside, or facing towards the tailgate, but the other is the latches are different sizes. The smaller latches, the bottom piece that drops into the bed, they're actually smaller on the forward two or the two mounting locations closest to the cab of the vehicle. The two rear mounting locations are actually just a little bit bigger. It's a good idea to get an extra set of hands to help you get the base up into position, as this unit is rather heavy. Once we have all four of the legs or the pins dropped into position, go ahead and take the handle, close the handle down. Want to make sure that there's no movement, that it's nice and secure. You can then take the pin, go back through and clip it like that so that it can't be opened back up. Then go ahead and repeat this same process at the other three mounting locations. As you can see, with all the latches secure the base cannot move. It's securely fastened to the bed of the vehicle. Next we're going to need to attach the pivot arms. There's three sets of holes built into the base so it'll allow you to put the pivot arms either towards the back or towards the front, as well as you'll also notice that these are kind of offset. Being that this is a shortbed truck, we're going to use the two rear mounting holes as well as with our pivot arm straight up and down towards the rear. This will scoot the 5th wheel head as far back as possible, giving us the most clearance between our 5th wheel trailer and the cab of our vehicle. There's also several holes for the height adjustment to allow you to adjust from 17 to 19". We're going to go ahead and choose the middle setting so that we're at 18". Since we don't know exactly which camper or trailer they're going to be towing, this is a good starting spot and you may need to adjust depending on your height of your camper or trailer. To attach our pivot arms to the base we'll be using these 1/2" bolts, 1/2" lock washer. It'll go through the pivot arm, through the base and into these threaded blocks. It'll slide in on the back side. You will notice that the threaded part is only closer to one side so you have an area where there's no threads, and the bolt will need to thread in like this, so that you go through the unthreaded part first and then into the threads. If you turn it around the other way it may not allow the bolt to fully tighten down, causing the pivot arms to be loose. We'll go ahead and take one of our bolts, get one on both sides so it stays. Now that we have this side installed hand-tight we'll go ahead and repeat the process over here on the driver's side. Now with all of our hardware installed loosely we can go ahead and tighten it all down and then torque it to the manufacturer's specification. Next we're going to need to put together the leveling spring here and clip. We'll take our clip and the spring. You'll notice how it has this little indentment piece on it. We'll go through, come out like that, put the small locknut on it. There's a nylon locknut. It'll be on there like that. Go ahead and take our wrench and socket and tighten everything down. Here's what our assembly looks like. Next we're going to need to position this on the driver's side pivot arm so this clip here will slide onto the pivot arm and it'll be positioned like this so that this end of the spring is facing forward. When positioned correctly, the top piece of the spring here should be 1/2" below the bottom section of this rubber piece, so 1/2" from here to the bottom of here. We've gone ahead and taken the head of the 5th wheel, set it upside down on some cardboard here. We need to remove this pin with the clip. That will allow the arm to open up. We're then going to take the handle . You'll notice how there's three holes. The clip will go in this outer hole so the two inner holes will have a locking flange nut and this Allen key-style bolt here. We'll take the bolt, slide it underneath, put the locknut on top, do that for the other mounting location, as well, tighten everything down. Now with the hardware tightened down we'll go ahead and re-close the arm, put the clip and the pin back in it. Next we're going to need to go ahead and remove the pin and clip from each side so that we can set the head onto our pivot arms. Pull the pin, do that for both sides. With that done, we're ready to set the head of the 5th wheel on top of the pivot arms. That'll do it for the installation of the B&W Companion OEM 5th Wheel Hitch for Ram Towing Prep Package vehicles rated for 25,000 pounds, part number BWRVK3600, as installed here on our 2015 Ram 3500 Heavy Duty Crew Cab Pickup. .