Installing a Tow Hitch on an Acura MDX
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- Опубліковано 17 чер 2018
- Want to DIY install a tow hitch on your car? Whether you are towing a teardrop, off road toys or a utility trailer, a good tow hitch is needed. I installed one so I could tow my CampInn teardrop. Here is a step by step video of the process. While this is for my Acura MDX, the process should be similar for most cars and trucks with only minor differences.
Instructions can be found here:
acura.bernardiparts.com/Image... - Авто та транспорт
Thank you for your video. Without yours, I can't install it by myself.
You are welcome. Thanks for watching.
Great job on this and your transmission cooler videos. Saved me a lot of time by avoiding trial and error method. Thanks again
Glad they helped. More videos coming soon, just need to find some time and clear weather. Will be doing a brake fluid flush, tire rotation and brake inspection soon on the Acura. Also looking at adding a NavTek box so we can get our phones up on the map screen.
Thank you for making this video, i just bought a new MDX and was a bit concern about paying thousands to get it installed, but now I feel confident that i can do it.
You are very welcome. It's not bad at all, just need to find the parts online. I would go with the Acura hitch though and not an aftermarket. It looks way better and the wire harness makes the job way easier.
Many thanks! Made the job so much easier following your methodical and systematic video on installing the tow hitch!
Glad it helped. Thanks for watching.
Thank you. Following your video, I installed a tailer hitch all by myself.
Nice work! Glad the video helped.
Great job.. I need to do this next week and you made it look so easy. Thank you
You are welcome. It's not too difficult....easier if you have an extra set of hands but jack stands work in a pinch. Good luck
I installed the Curt system for MDX. Worked good. Hitch sits below the plastic, but high enough. Wiring plugged right in just like OEM. Thanks for the videos!
Thanks for sharing
you made it look very easy. Great job!!
Thanks. I do my best to break it down such that anyone will feel confident trying to do a job like this.
Thanks to this video, I just installed my Tow Hitch. I ran into a small problem where the bolt holes closest to the bumper were rusted out but I was able to save them with a metal brush and an impact drill.
Great video! This helped me out a ton. Thank you!
Thanks for watching.
Great video. Looking forward to do this myself.
Thanks. Glad you enjoyed it. Stay tuned for more. I need to do a brake job on the car and will post that video once completed.
Very nicely explained,
Thanks for sharing 🙏
You are welcome. Thanks for watching.
Great job on the works btw!
Thanks,
Great work on the hitch video. Just did mine and worked out exactly as you described. Thanks for putting this together. It was very helpful.
Glad it helped. Thanks for stopping by and leaving a comment.
Really appreciate the video and great job
You are welcome. Glad the video helped.
Excellent video, with attention to detail 🙌
Wife has a '20 MDX, but still 3G '14-'20👍
Thanks for watching. Glad you enjoyed it.
Thank you for this. Big help.
Thanks for watching.
@24:35 In my opinion you don't need to cut an x on the liner to feed the harness through. As you can see when you tap and push the liner lightly, the liner is loosely laying on the floor. You just need to feed the harness through the hole, bend it gently towards the back of the car and route it towards the fuse box. There's plenty of slack and the harness will stay NEATLY underneath the liner out of sight, IMO
The X wasn't the liner, that was the grommet that seals the floor pan hole.
Just to THANK YOU very much for this video. I did the installation on my 2017 MDX and it was a breeze. It saved me many hours of pain and suffering. :) The parts number changed for the 2017 but they are exactly the same parts. Thanks again!
You are very welcome, glad it helped. Thanks for dropping by and checking out the video.
Thanks your video helped alot. Made it a breeze
Glad it helped. Thanks for watching
Great video buddy thanks
Thanks for watching.
Great video thank you
Thanks for stopping by. Glad you enjoyed the video.
Thanks for the video
You are welcome. Thanks for watching.
this is great, thanks! not gonna do it myself
No problem. It's really not a hard job but I get that sometimes it's easier just to pay to have something done.
thanks, I got my MDX used with the hitch, but no harness. I took the hitch off for some rust correction, and I was going to put it back on and then put the harness in later, but now I know to order the harness before I reinstall the hitch!
Yep. Found that out the hard way but all in all, it came out great. Did yours come with a transmission cooler as well?
@@RoughRidersTV no, it didn't. really odd to have JUST the hitch, IMO. For now I'm just going to stick with the 3500lb setup, but might do the trans cooler if I need to. From what I've heard the OE trans coolers are not good enough to keep up with towing on these SUVs
@@TheFiremonkeyman I installed the OE on mine and it works fine for me but I'm only hauling a teardrop plus gear. I did use it to haul my SxS on a flatbed trailer for a while and it was fine too but I also have a truck so more often I would use that because I was hauling gas cans and a bunch of other stuff that did not fit on the flatbed with the SxS.
I did post a video of the OE cooler install as well if you need it.
@@RoughRidersTV just wanted to follow up - just re-installed my trailer hitch and the wiring kit install went super easy thanks to your video!
@@TheFiremonkeyman Glad it helped. Thanks for the update.
Thank you for posting this tutorial, exactly what I need. Do you have to install a brake controller or Mdx already got that taken care of if you use their wiring harness?
Yes, you would need to add a brake controller. I didn't do that because I am only hauling a teardrop which is very light so the brakes on the car are more than enough.
Even for a handy guy like me who is not a mechanic this was PERFECT - man!!! Wow - thank you soooooo much! Can you explain why the extra transmission cooler is necessary? Mine is base, towing small boat or 2 jet skis.
When you tow, you are increasing the stress on the transmission and therefore, it will run hotter. Therefore, without the cooler, Acura has a tow limit of 3K lbs. If you tow anything heavier than that, you will cause the tranmission to overheat. Adding a cooler helps improve the performance of the transmission under heaving loads which means you can tow up to 5K lbs with the cooler installed without causing the transmission to overheat.
This is just for people want to do this kind of job like I did it on my Mdx 2018 I used any string to tie 1 end 1st to the Frame and do the job at the end.....
Great tip. Thanks for sharing.
Nice Video you have here. I’m just wondering did your wiring harness come with trailer break and aux port, i can wire 4 pin but converting to 7 way blade i don’t know to wire my trailer break with is the blue wire. Need help.
Yes, the harness had the 7 pin round connector with the blades as part of it which includes the trailer brake. It does not have a 4 way flat though as I just ran into that issue a few days ago. I rented a car dolly from u haul that only had a 4 way flat. I needed an adapter to go from 4 way flat to 7 way round.
Nice video, thanks for sharing it with us, how expensive are the oem hitch kit compared to after market?
Thanks. I would guess about $150 more at the time I made the video. Not sure if that gap is more or less now.
Great video, it helped a lot...just one question...we installed the trailer hitch and wiring harness just as you instructed, however, after we finished and checked the lights we found that once we hooked up to the trailer, the left and right turn signals worked, the break lights worked and the hazard lights worked, but the actual lights for running after dark did not work (yep...they work on the MDX...and we checked that the lights were not set to Auto). There were a couple of left over circuit breakers that you didn't mention, could these be for trailer nighttime running lights? Note: we checked with a load reader to make sure all the fuses we installed were working, and we checked the trailer with another vehicle and running lights were working fine. Did you run into this problem? Did we miss something? Any ideas??
I don't recall having any issues like that...we just towed our teardrop across country and the running lights seemed fine. I will double check though and let you know what i find out. May be a bit though as I broke my finger and need to heal up so i get some motion back.
Hi there, the kit that you have is it gonna fit to my 2019 acura mdx? And if you can please post a picture of the back of your mdx. I just want it to see what is look like. Thank you and good job for making this video.
I don't know if it is the same or not. However, if you look up the OEM hitch for your year, you should be able to find the PN# for it. Then search on that PN# and scour the web for the best price. That is pretty much what I did. The install process should be the same.
The CampInn teardrop seems pretty light but have you loaded it down and measured the rear sag? Curious what loading of a 400 pound tongue and stuff in the back does to the rear end on this MDX. Thank you
While I haven't specifically measured it, I did load it up with all the extra camp gear, coolers, etc. and look to see if there was any significant sag. It was still riding level and I didn't see the rear fender/wheel gap squash out at all. There was probably about 1/2 to 1" droop at most. I'm not sure how much weight it actually was that I added but with the loaded cooler, chairs, canopy, Dutch oven, fire pit, lanterns, coals, etc. it was adding up for sure. But I will take a look at measuring before/after loading sag and see how it shakes out. I have a trip to yellowstone next week and we are taking the MDX so it will be a good opportunity to look at it in more detail.
Awesome video!
Do you know if this install would be problematic with a full size spare tire held by the drop down system, the same way as your donut? Its a bit larger than the factory "compact spare"...and I fear might come in contact with the hitch "arms" or whatever we're calling the part that craws underneath to be bolted into the frame
There is plenty of room there, I think a full size spare would fit without issue.
@@RoughRidersTV Sounds good! Thanks for the response, and again the great video!
Hi! I was wondering how much did you pay for the total ? As I am understanding, we need two separate kits : the hitch and wire harness?
correct, 2 separate part numbers. I think I paid about 80 for the harness and 270 for the hitch kit.
Did you remove the right grill block? In the instructions link its mentioned that its important to remove the right grille block for increased cooling capacity while towing.
On our MDX, there is not grill block. The grill is wide open both above and below the V shape on the grill. The only thing that might even be considered a grill block would be under the headlights and those don't interfere with airflow to the radiator or the transmission cooler. So everything gets plenty of airflow and stays cool even when towing.
I’m just wondering why you cut they piece and didn’t try to take it out first. Just to see if it could be fished in a way that didn’t require cutting. I had a hitch installed in my 02 MDX and they didn’t have to cut that part to fish the wires through. Something tells me you may have been able to install that without cutting that lining. I’ll be buying a 20156-16 MDX next month and will be installing a hitch as soon as I get it. Appreciate this. I’m hoping it helps me when the time comes.
Thanks for the comment. I am not sure which piece you are talking about? Are you referencing the trim piece where I cut out the plastic or the liner where I made the X in the floor liner? If you are talking about the trim piece it is because I was installing the factory wire harness and it needs to pop out of the trim piece. If talking about the liner, I needed to do that to pass the wire harness into the cab so I can connect to the control module box. In both cases, it is fine as there is no lasting impacts and is exactly what they would need to do at the factory when installing. If you are not adding the wire harness (for example not hauling a trailer), then you do not need to cut the trim piece.
Rough Riders I actually can see why that cut was necessary now. I was having s hard time picturing what exactly you were cutting but after a second look I get it. I guess it’s hard to see everything on video. That’s a great job. I was looking at aftermarket trailer hitches but after seeing the difference between the aftermarket and the original I think I’ll spend the extra on the Acura parts.
@@AmerijamAcres I had considered the aftermarket stuff as well but the OEM hitch was just so much cleaner of an install and not having a pigtail dangling down was worth it. I should have shown a completed install so it was easier to see everything. So, while the OEM hitch was more expensive, it was worth it in the end as they make everything look so much better. The hitch also rides higher as well. Good luck with your install. Feel free to ask any questions if you need anything.
I noticed u mentioned that u should had to install the wire harness before installing the tool hitch. What's the difference doing the harness before the Hitch installation? Thanks gain for your tutorial. 🤗
You are not installing the harness before the hitch. You are attaching the harness on the hitch itself before bolting the hitch in place and popping it through the new trim piece. Once the harness is attached and then the hitch bolted in place, you finish installing the harness inside the rear part of the cabin.
Another happy mdxer with hitch and harness installed because of you! I read somewhere to torque to 139 ftlbs! I tried but I could feel my 3/8” extension starting to twist! Is 75ftlb really enough??
I think it is. Your wheels are torqued to about 75 ft/lbs. You can go higher if you feel like it but I haven't had any issues at all. I did use threadlocker on them so they wouldn't back out.
@@RoughRidersTV acura.bernardiparts.com/Images/Install/2017_MDX_TrailerHitch_BII03445-29.pdf
I got curious and found 70 ftlb is the official number! You can link this to your description and call it!
@@tnutss Thanks. Those instructions would have come in handy. I didn't have instructions to work from but looks like I got all the same steps, though I did find one out the hard way. LOL. Thanks for the link, I will add it to the description. Figured 75lbs was pretty close to what was required.
Hi, I had a dealer install an OEM hitch, harness and cooler on my MDX. Since then, battery won’t hold a charge. Anyone have a similar issue? Or any ideas? It seems to be a slow draw on the battery.
Sorry, missed this comment. Sounds like the harness is shorting out somewhere. Try disconnecting the harness from the box and see if your battery discharge issue goes away. You can see in the video where it wires in and can just undo the plug. If the discharge goes away, I would head back to the dealer and have them resolve the issue. Could be a bad control box or just a bad wire harness.
Do you really need the transmission cooler part? I won't be towing heavy stuff that much but also dont want to destroy my transmission
Specs on my 15AWD without cooler is 3500lbs. It's more than enough for my teardrop but I added it anyway which puts the tow capacity up to 5000lbs. Heat is the enemy of any transmission so the cooler you run it, the better it is for the transmission. Keep in mind, towing capacity is not just the weight of the trailer, the weight of everything and every one in the car are part of that total of the GVWR which is directly related to your tow capacity.
Your video is awesome! I bought an OEM trailer hitch set and a transmission cooler kit. I started the hitch installation yesterday and managed to install almost everything successfully, except two bolts. The issue I experienced was that two bolts only went half way and then it became impossible to go any further. I tried to loosen other bolts and switch bolts. The results were the same. I was afraid of destroying the inner thread on the frame. What else should I try? What could be the cause of the problem? Appreciated!
I would start by soaking some WD40 or other rust breaker up in there and then run the bolt up to see if you can clear the threads. If that doesn't work, you could get a tap/die set, find the right size and that should clear it. Those bolt holes can get pretty mucked up. Mine wasn't too bad but there was a spot that started to hang up.
Thank you! I’ll give it a try. I would say that I would never attempt to do such DIY project, if not for your videos! Super helpful and very nicely made!
@@BZ-mo1dv Thanks, glad it helped. That is actually why I started the channel originally. Trying to help others learn to DIY and save some money. It's grown to include other stuff since then but I still try to capture any DIY maintenance stuff as I go. More stuff coming on the MDX, just need to find time. Please share with your friends, any help spreading the word is appreciated and helps me grow the channel.
I have the same issue with the two rear bolts on my 18. I'm going to try a thread chaser to clean the gunk out
I ended up bringing my MDX to a mechanic shop and have them installed the bolts for me. As with any DIY projects, things rarely go smoothly. But nonetheless, it’s still worth the time and frustration. I feel empowered after completing some DIY projects on my car.
Great video. How much did the Acura hitch kit and harness cost you?
Thanks for the comment. I think I paid around $100 for the harness and $275ish for the hitch kit.
Where did you get the hitch kit from? I can’t find it for less than $360 after shipping.
@@ma3680 I honestly don't remember. It may have been AcuraOEMParts.com or something like that...I typically just search on the part number until I find the right deal.
I would torque it to atleast 80 ft lbs of tq... maybe 80 or 90 just to be safe... but atleast 80 ft lbs forsure !
Nothing wrong with going a little higher on the torque but I'm comfortable with 70 ft/lbs and the thread locker. I've towed a lot a lot of stuff since I installed in and not a single issue. Car can only tow up to 5K lbs so we are not talking about 12K lbs trailers here...it's all light duty towing. The hitch isn't going anywhere at 70 ft/lbs.
Which wiring did you use?
I ordered the OEM wire harness. It plugs into the car's wiring. I show that in the video starting at the 24:06 mark. If you are asking about the part number for the wiring harness, it is listed at the 2:35 mark
@@RoughRidersTV is it 4 pin or 7?
@@tashfinrahman472 I literally show you the entire wiring harness in the video. Did you actually watch the video?
Wish I would've known the after market didn't have the integrated panel and the flange for the wiring harness. Big mistake.
Yep, it's the main reason why I chose the OEM setup. It just integrates much cleaner. Cost more but was worth it.
Where did you purchase it?
In most of my videos, I just buy things from different places. I typically just start searching online based upon the part numbers to find the lowest cost for each item and order them. I don't recall which site I got the hitch from, it might have been AcuraOEMparts.com or something like that...this was a while back. Sorry I can't give you a better answer.
what brand is the trailer hitch
This is the OEM hitch from Acura.
@@RoughRidersTV thx
You are welcome. @@mbaset71
Why don’t u just use your drill to tighten it ?
My drill would not be able to tighten them enough for my satisfaction. I felt it best to use the torque wrench so I knew they would have a safe margin. I also don't want to run the bolts in too fast and risk cross threading them.
Thanks for this. Very helpful. FYI, 70 lb ft. seems right (see p. 8 in this installation manual if you want to link to it in your notes): acura.bernardiparts.com/Images/Install/2017_MDX_TrailerHitch_BII03445-29.pdf
Thanks for dropping by and sharing the install guide.