Trailer Wiring Troubles

[Rainman]

Okay, this is where I sit, The trailer is back from the paint shop, and I have the tub off doing the undercoating and touching up some areas. Ran the wire harness today after replacing the pigtail with one in better condition. Though it took a magnifying glass to see the metal tags, all is wired correctly, as far as I can tell. Backed the jeep up and plugged in the pigtail and NOTHIN, NADA, ZILCH. My first thought is poor grounding of the housings due to the nice new paint. I ran out of light before I could get the meter out to trace the circuits, but is that the most likely cause, poor ground connection?

Rainman

[k8icu]

Grrrrr... I had a whole post written and fat fingered some windows short cut combo and poof it was gone. GRRRRRR!

As I was saying. Check the voltage at the connector on the jeep make sure that you have the correct voltage on the correct pins. Also check the grounds. Make sure you have the gound wire in the cable hooked up and grounded to the frame of the trailer. Use a internal/external star washer to make the connection. Use them also on the lights themselves. If you want to over kill ground down to bare metal hook the lights up with the new washers and the ground cable and then prime and paint...Fixes grounding every time...

If you have any problems you can give me a call if you haven't lost my phone number.

[Rainman]

Hey Joe,

I know for sure the pins on the M151 are hot, as other trailer lights function when connected to it. I am using the star washers inner an outer, but didn't dig them hard thru the paint; yet. As for gronds in the harness, I'll have to get out the TM and check the lead numbers.

As for your number, lost it, heck I threw it away whn I found out your were withholding parts from me! I think it's still here somewhere if I didn't loose it. When the sun comes up, I'll have this problem by the short hairs!

Rainman

[rickf]

Quick ground check, Take your jumper cables (you do have them right?) Clamp one on the trailer pintle and the other end on the jeep pintle. That will ground the trailer to the jeep and tell you if it is a ground problem with the trailer. I drove a tractor trailer across the country with a jumper cable for the ground! I was dropping the trailer in Oregon and picking up another and I was not going to spend hours trying to find a bad ground. Hooked one jumper to the trailer glad hand and the other end to the truck glad hand, couple of wire ties to the air line and good to go. 2800 miles and lights never even flickered!
Rick

[Rainman]

Hey rickf,

Do I have them, that's funny. I once got an email titled, "You Know Your From Ohio If...

One of the first on the list was, "If you always carry jumper cables in your car", another was "you know several people that have hit a deer". Personally I always carry jumper cables, and while on my way to go deer hunting a few years ago, I got a 10 point buck, with a Mountaineer!

I think my lack of a ground is from the light housing to the trailer itself, not just between the jeep and the trailer. Will do your check straight to the light itself to check that out.

Rainman

[Rainman]

Got a little time in on it today. I took a NOS composite light and wired it straight to the pigtail, and it worked. Took the light to the rear and swapped it for the mounted one, and it worked again! Plugged in the mounted light, and nothing again. Started to check the bulbs, and not sure what the chance is that all bulbs were either bad, or had bad contact to their sockets. The blackout bulbs were ok, but one is real bright, maybe a 12v bulb. I never checked them out as these were lights I bought of a G503 member that took them off an early 60's M101 trailer. Somewhere along the line they may have been used for a 12v application. I'll check the old bulbs out later. So for now, the lights are at 100% and the tub goes back on tomorrow. Such a basic oversight, I should have started with the basics first. So the moral of the story is, if your TV don't work, check and see if it's plugged in!

[k8icu]

That's fine I didn't want to talk to you anyway....

[mumble] Try to help a guy out and all you get is grief...lol [mumble/off]

The frame looks good Ray!