[benny__]

Hey all,

New 3 Series Touring owner - previously an Audi S3 hooligan - which I traded in as I needed to tow.

I'd been reading the forums on here for a while to get a feel for the types of towbars and harnesses available and got a bit of feedback before ordering (horrors/complexities etc.).

So, bearing this in mind - I obviously ignored all advice (standard) and went ahead with whatever was in stock

So some feedback for others looking to do the same ...

I'd ordered the PCT towbar (this) and vehicle specific wiring kit from PF Jones.

To be honest, I didn't realise how easy it was going to be - about 10 screws and the bumper was off with minimal effort - then about 10 screws later the whole boot interior was stripped.



The towbar itself was particularly easy to install - no cuts to heatshield, bumper or rear diffuser (anything in fact) - it was bolt on. Only observation I have is that it clearly doesn't offer the impact protection of the factory crash bar.

I'd suggest throwing some blue thread lock on all but the main bumper nuts (as they don't have nylock nuts and you don't want to be re-tightening them).



The hitch itself is really solid and its miles more substantial compared to the OEM one on my MY22 Defender 110.



Then on to the wiring, this is where it wasn't quite such a factory fit. Despite the kit being "vehicle specific" - this only really means that it picks up signals from CANBUS for the lights - but has no bearing on the install itself. I was hoping to just have a plug that went into the BMW harness and away I went, but sadly scotch locks were required :'(

From what I gathered though, this was pretty common with most aftermarket kits anyway, I couldn't find any that were 100% plug and play.

The harness wants to pick up brake lights, right indicator and rear fog (for redundancy) and CANBUS for everything else - so you have to find and splice those.

For those doing this themselves, the instructions do say that there's multiple wires with the same colour coding (really helpful) - and the only feedback I can offer is that for the brake lights and right indicator (Green/Grey and Blue/Brown) - you want the thicker wires with the straight stripes (not spiral stripes). For the fog light, there's two near identical Black/Yellow (thin) wires - there's few ways to tell this apart without a probe sadly.

I didn't need to drill the boot as suggested - as there's a ~25mm blanked hole under the drivers rear cluster that is just big enough to squeeze the loom out through (and seal up) - it pops out just at the end of the heat shield - near the PDC connector.

The removable hitch has a decent lock (not a crappy wafer lock) - and is easy to remove/install.

This is what the finished article looks like from the underside.



Its completely invisible tucked away - so no need for a photo to demonstrate that.

Now I've got to learn about ESYS/Bimmercode (ENET cable coming today), so that I can disable PDC when towing and enable the towball camera.

Something I'll miss from the Defender - is that you can leave the cameras on whilst driving any speed (so watching the tow hitch is handy on long distance drives with questionable trailers) - but from what I can see with BMW, there's no way to keep the camera on permanently when moving.

[JNW1]

Great effort, you're much braver than I am to have attempted that as a DIY job!