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[feeutfo]

fitting tow bar to my 3.2 saloon tomorrow, just wanted to run it past you guys and girls, before i start drilling holes in the wrong place or something daft.

I am presuming, from a brief offering up today that the long metal plate goes in the boot and involves drilling through the pre marked dimples on the floor with a 8/10 mill drill???

And that i will have to remove the black plastic cover inside on the boot lip/shuts although i can see a break out panel so maybe not....?  and remove/ possibly trim the rear bumper to finish the job???

any advice gratefully received....PS i have given little thought to the electrics at this stage.

oh and its for a bike trailer before i am wrongly accused of being a pikey  

forgot the pic

[alexandjen]

It makes the job easier if you remove the plastic trim panel, I didn't have to remove or cut the bumper when I fitted mine.

You will need to remove some of the sound deadening material from the boot floor to get access to the dimples, clear an area large enough to take the washers, I've since learnt that heating it with a hot air gun makes it a lot easier to remove.

Yours looks like a different design to mine, have you got any tubular spacers to drop through the drill holes in the boot floor to bridge the sub frame?

What make is the towbar?

[Entwood]

Also looks very different to mine ... but mine is not a detachable hitch, and is on a facelift.

I can take some photo's tomorrow if you wish

[alexandjen]

Yeh mine's also fixed and on a facelift, while you've got the trim panel off you may as well wire it up as the connector sits behind the panel......well it does on a facelift anyway :-/

[feeutfo]

it is a gm item. the spacers are shown, ive layed them on the plate pointing at the holes which is not very clear in the pic.

I will go take some clearer stills.

[alexandjen]

Yes can see them now

[feeutfo]

hows this

[Kevin Wood]

The plate on the boot floor will give you hassles if you want to fit a LPG cylinder tank in the boot - but not a spare wheel one.

SImilar to the one I used to have. Fitting is pretty straightforward and it sounds like you're on the right track. The spacers go inside the crossmember by the diff, from underneath, and the large penny washers go on the underside to cover the holes they went in.

Just 9 holes to drill in the boot floor as already marked.

Heat the sound deadening tar with a hot air paint stripper and then use a decorator's trowl to remove the bits under the plate. Comes off like butter when hot. Impossible when cold.

Kevin

[Andy B]

....
SImilar to the one I used to have.  .....

[size=8]It's still in the box standing up in the corner of my garage[/size]    

[feeutfo]

The plate on the boot floor will give you hassles if you want to fit a LPG cylinder tank in the boot - but not a spare wheel one.

SImilar to the one I used to have. Fitting is pretty straightforward and it sounds like you're on the right track. The spacers go inside the crossmember by the diff, from underneath, and the large penny washers go on the underside to cover the holes they went in.

Just 9 holes to drill in the boot floor as already marked.

Heat the sound deadening tar with a hot air paint stripper and then use a decorator's trowl to remove the bits under the plate. Comes off like butter when hot. Impossible when cold.

Kevin

thanks Kevin, i presume remove all the foam from the whole area of the plate? to get it to sit snug to the floor, imagine it may bend if tightened down and just the corners/areas around the holes are
cleared. Also i guess some sort of rust prevention around the bare metal when the holes are drilled? i have a tin of under body spray...?


I hate drilling holes in cars, but better get used to though, tow bar as this is the start of the lpg install. i itend to use a double socket on the bar and use one for the lpg filler.

[Andy B]

...... i itend to use a double socket on the bar and use one for the lpg filler.

How about using the plastic trim at the bottom of the rear wing like :-

[feeutfo]

yeah maybe,(i thought you ment the rear wing on the boot lid for a minute, wtf.) will see how it turns out when fitted it may be too low and inaccessable  to put the filler on the tow bar.

Battle is a a fluid situation, constantly changeing tac tics will be required to win the war. That and a big f off Hammer...  

[Miggy24]

I`ll be fitting a tow bar to my estate soon are there markings in the boot floor to where the holes will be drilled too

[Kevin Wood]

I think I removed all of the tar under the whole plate. The mountings are actually proud of the bottom of the plate so you might get away with just removing it around the mountings. The important thing is that the tar is not supporting the plate anywhere because, given time, it will flatten and the assembly could become loose.

I tidied up all holes with a bit of wet and dry, then hammerited them and applied some waxoyl once that had dried.

Kevin

[feeutfo]

thanks guys, all done bar the electrics, i guess i can get a connector to match the cars plug from the dealer? And i will have to take the bumper off again as the reverseing sensors are on a constant tone, they where a pain to dis/re connect from the bumper as the wires are a bit too short, i probably did not push a plug back on properly.

I had to remove all the tarmac from the boot floor, the plate would not sit low enough to line up with the 3 holes below the boot lock on the vertical face otherwise. I put a fan heater face down with an inch gap from the floor, and it fairly zipped straight off, so not too bad. Although the fan cut out once so had to raise it a fraction more to let it "breath" a bit better.

Yes Devonboy the holes where pre marked, but i would suggest, on a saloon at least, drilling the 3 under the boot lock on the upright face, bolt it up, and then using the plate as a template or drill directly through the holes in the plate and ignore the pre marked dimples to a degree as they didnt line up. I had to re drill 5 mill or so off centre, no biggy, just would have saved some time, and some ovalised holes.

Had to cut the bumper round the swan neck which made me cringe, and ill have to trim it more when i get the plugs mounted i suspect.

I think the tow bar is going to be too low to mount the lpg filler, it really is tucked up out the way, which is good, as with the swan neck removed its hard to spot the tow bar gubbins at all. Guess ill be needing a hole cutter then.
Thanks for replys gents.

Chris.  :-)