Hitch Installation Review

[42pilot]

I bought the Invisihitch, without the wiring package, suitable for towing - 600 tongue weight and 7,700 tow capacity - but bought it primarily for my dual Kuat bike rack.

First of all, the hitch is very well built with quality welds and a very nice even powder coating. Although not much hardware is required, you get everything you need including fasteners you will replace that hold fender body parts in place. These are generic fasteners and not as nice as BMW stuff, but chances are, you'll never see the fasteners again because of their location. Anyway, the hitch, receiver, and coupler are made of solid steel and everything weighs about 50 lbs.

The instructions are good, but you better have some experience in removing modern snap-together body parts and understand how the fastening works. There is a lot of pulling while pushing tabs and plastic is bending, knowing all the while these parts will be expensive to replace if broken. So the instructions I would say are 75% complete as they could have been written better explaining how the fasteners work and how to tilt the parts in order for it to be removed easily.

It took me two hours to disassemble the rear of the car, and less than 30 min to install the hitch and replace everything. Taking my time and taking care to un-snap each part carefully, I think paid off when I reinstalled everything.

When I was finished, I was impressed how well the hitch is hidden, how easy the coupler and receiver assemble and attach to the hitch, how solid the the hitch feels attached to the car, and how quickly and easily the car went back together. There are some anxious moments pulling parts apart and hearing loud snaps and pops, so this job is not for everyone.

Here are some pics.

[viperdoc]

Great review. One tip for others installing a hitch...go to etrailer.com and look up hitches for the x5. They have a great video of how to take apart the rear bumper cover, even explaining how each plastic fastener works. The video is of a 2011 x5 but the fasteners are all the same. Using the video I got my bumper off in about 30 minutes and didn't break a thing (which is pretty monumental for me)

[Terp335]

Nice review! I love my hitch too.