Towbar on Zafira B

[cross-keys]

Fitting a towbar is a relatively simple job on the Zafira B. There are a number of towbars available from different manufacturers. This article covers the fitting of a Witter G99A - which will fit models with and without the spare wheel. This towbar is the conventional kind where the towball is bolted on with two large bolts - as opposed to the swan-neck variety - although the fitting may well be similar. This model was chosen because I wanted to bolt a heavy-duty bike rack bracket to the towbar - which rules out using a swan-neck.

The towbar comes packed in a large cardboard box banded shut.



The towbar centre told me that the 'green label' means that the towball is included in the kit.



This is what you get in the box.



Aside from the main bar and the two side brackets, you get the towball, the cover and the bracket for the electrical socket,

Fastner-wise, you get two large nuts & bolts to bolt the towball on, four medium-size nuts & bolts (two long, two short) which pass through the towbar, through the body shell and through the side brackets, and finally you get four small bolts together with two different kinds of captive nuts which are used to bolt the side bracket arms to rails on the underside of the car body shell.



The first job is to remove the rear light clusters. These are held in by two white thumb screws, which can be reached once the plastic covers have been removed.



On the nearside, there is an additional small cover that can be removed by pushing it out from behind (put your hand through the aperture where the large cover fits into). This allows access to the top thumb screw which is very awkward to get to otherwise.



Once the thumb screws have been removed, and the multi-pole connectors unplugged, the clusters can then be removed.



The next job is to remove the rear bumper which is held in by four torx bolts, two inside each wheel arch.



There are also two plastic rivets on the bottom which needs the pins pulling out which then allows them to be removed.

Once this has been done, then the sides of the bumper need to be released, which is done by pulling carefully to separate the plastic clips.



If your vehicle has parking sensors, then these will need to be unplugged.

The bumper may then be removed by pressing on the tabs at the base of the light clusters, and pulling backwards.



Once the bumper has been removed, the foam packing can also be removed, and the five nuts securing the inner crash beam to the body can then be undone - which will allow the crash beam to be removed.



There are two dimples on the rear of the car which are now visible - these need to be drilled out to approx 25mm, to allow the metal tubes in the towbar kit to be slid through. I used a holesaw for this.



Behind the panel you are drilling, there is another panel which already has a 25mm hole bored into it. Unfortunately, the dimple doesn't always quite align with the centre of the existing hole, so rather than using a 25mm hole cutter, I would suggest using something like a 23mm or 24mm hole cutter, and then filing the hole out to the correct size while also aligning the hole with the pre-existing one behind. This picture shows the two layers of metal - the hole cutter only cut the outer layer.



Now the holes have been cut, there is bare metal exposed to the elements - which is probably a good recipe for rusting to occur. I masked off around the holes and sprayed the area with hammerite aerosol. Brush paint may have been better.



While the paint is drying, it is a good time to fit the two side brackets to the underside of the car.

Firstly, fit the captive nuts - I'm a fan of copperslip, so I coated the nuts in it before fitting them to the car. The nut in the picture is the one nearest the front of the car.



You push it into the slot (using the bolt as a handle) and then rotate it 90 degrees, which holds it into position.



The other captive nut is the slide-in type, and fits into the square hole.



Here it is in position - I used some copperslip on this one too.



The side brackets can now be fitted and loosely bolted into place. The reason for the bridge in the brackets is to bridge over an exhaust mount on the nearside. The offside bracket (pictured) still has a bridge, but no exhaust mount!



Here is view of the rear of the side bracket. The long bolt needs to pass through the hole at the top, and out towards the rear of the car.



Once the paint has dried, remove the masking, and slide the long bolt through the hole in the side bracket, while feeding the metal spacer in through the 25mm hole you cut earlier. The two should meet like this.



With the two long bolts in position, the towbar can then be fitted and the nuts done up loosely. Also the two shorter (bottom) bolts can be fitted through the towbar, through the car body and through the bottom hole in the side bracket. Those nuts can also be done up loosely.

With the towbar and brackets all held on with the eight bolts, it is a matter of holding the towbar in the correct position and then tightening the bolts in turn. I did them in stages, at all times checking that everything seemed to be in the correct position.

Once the towbar has been fully tightened, the crash beam can be refitted over the tow bar, and the five nuts securing it can be tightened.







TO BE CONTINUED .....

[pecky]

Don't know how I missed this, copied to the how to's.

Nice clear guide, thanks for that.

[farrc392]

Very Glad to find this post. Used it to remove the towbar on my Zafira before I trade it in. Exactly the towbar also so no issues. Thanks

[pecky]

It is a very concise guide, was good of him to post and glad it helped in reverse

[farrc392]

Now to sell it a fit one to my new meriva

[Nierux]

The most interesting part for me is missing - towbar electricity.
How did you connected towbar? Because Rear Electrical Centre (REC) is removed from my car.



Thanks

[toofer]

Any ideas why I can't view images? Thanks.

[domtorredo]

Any ideas why I can't view images? Thanks.

Depends what are you using device browser etc on ios with tapatalk i see all images

[pecky]

I've updated the thumbnails setting, so you should see them now.

[toofer]

Weird they're showing up now, thanks anyway.