Setting up the etrailer Trailer Hitch Receiver on a 2014 Mazda CX-5

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Full transcript: https://www.etrailer.com/tv-install-e...
Shane Hey everyone, Shane here with etrailer.com. Today I have a 2014 Mazda CX-5. We're going to walk through how to install the etrailer.com Class III trailer hitch receiver. This is what our hitch is going to look like when its installed. You can see the cross tube is completely hidden behind the fascia. The only thing we really notice is our receiver tube, so it maintains a nice clean look on the back of the vehicle.

Being a Class III hitch, we're going to have a lot of different options. Cargo carriers, bike racks, if we're wanting to tow a hitch, this hitch is going to be able to do that. Two inch by two inch receiver tube opening, so it's going to be most common for a lot of different accessories. Reinforced collar can give us a little extra stability there. Hitch pin hole is going to 5/8 inch in diameter, take a standard 5/8 hitch pin.

Pin and clip does not come with the hitch. However, they can be found here at etrailer. Rolled steel safety chain loops, so if you are pulling a trailer that has some larger size safety chain hooks, you can be confident they're going to fit. Now I'm going to give you some weight capacities and measurements that'll help you when deciding on any of those hitch pin accessories, again like your bike racks, cargo carriers, and ball mounts. From the center of the hitch pin hole to the outermost part of our fascia, looking at about three and a half inches.

The number's important for any of your hitch pin accessories like your bike racks and cargo carriers. They're going to fold up against the vehicle. You're going to make sure they're not going to make contact. From the ground to the top innermost part of the receiver tube, we're looking at about 11 and a half inches. Most of your standard trailer heights are going to be much higher than that.

So, if you're going to put a ball mount on here and pull the trailer, you want to make sure you put it in the rise position. As far as our weight capacities go, we're going to have a 600 pound max tongue weight, which is the downward pressure on the inside of the receiver tube. So, whether you're loading the cargo carrier, bike racks, or even a trailer tow, you want to make sure we're not exceeding that. Trailer towing capacity, which is how much the hitch can pull, is going to be 4,000 pounds. That's going to be a trailer plus the load included. I always recommend checking the owner's manual of the Mazda, make sure the vehicle can handle that amount of weight. You want to go with the lowest number between the vehicle and the hitch. Now that we've gone over some of the features, let's walk through how to get it installed. To start our installation, if you have a plastic panel underneath here, you're going to have to remove it. We obviously don't, so we're going to move on to the next step. We're going to be lowering our exhaust. We're going to have a hanger here, here, and then two just on the backside. We're going to take a strap, you can hang it really from anywhere, I like to go from the springs because they're easy. We're going to go underneath our pipe here, so that when we remove those hangers our exhaust doesn't get damaged farther up. Now we're going to take some soapy water and we're going to spray it on each of our hangers. If you have a spray lubricant you can use that as well. And then we'll just take a pry bar and we'll pry that off there. We're going to repeat that same thing for the three remaining hangers. Now, your instructions aren't going to tell you this. I'm going to do it just to be safe. This wire that's connected right in the frame rail, I'm going to take a trim panel tool and pop that off. We're going to have one of these on each side. Once we get our hitch in place, we can always put that back in. That'll just ensure that we have enough room to get our hitch up in there. We're going to have two pieces of tape on the outside of the frame rail we need to remove. We're going to have one here. We're going to have one here. We're going to cut out the center. Most likely, this most forward one is going to be a weld nut. We'll be able to determine that once we get it out. You'll notice this rubber piece here. It's just some seam sealant. We're probably going to have to scrape that flat in order for our hitch to sit flat against the frame rail. So we'll go ahead and scrape that off first, and then we'll come back, and we'll remove the tape from each of the holes. You can use a flathead sc