Trailer Wiring BLOWING Fuse! Help, PLEASE!

[francene]

I wired the trailer lights, and this is the report:

Good News- Flashers work
Turn Signals work
Outer Stop ( brake ) lights work

Bad News- Inner stop (brake) lights don't work
Nightime lights don't work
Side markers don't work
Car's headlights didn't work also. We unpluged car from trailer, replaced blown fuse, and lights worked. Connected back to trailer again, and lights didn't work again and fuse blew again.

So there's a problem with the white or brown wire. The trailer plug originally had a short white wire coming off it; I had previously attached this wire to the license plate of the vehicle, and all worked fine.

I had the brilliant idea to attach a long piece of white wire to the short stub, run it into the trailer and attach all the white wires from side marker lights and tail lights to it. Also, I connected this white wire to a trailer frame bolt as a 'trailer ground'.

So where did I goof? I guess I don't understand the principle of the white wire and 'grounding'.

Fran

[floyd]

IMHO... trailer lights work best when grounds are isolated and returned through the plug to the TV.
DOT trailer lights have no need for a ground to the trailer frame.

[Marty Smiltneek]

Hi Fran

Just got home a while ago and thought I would look at the board.
I suspect you have mis-identified what is power and what is ground on your lights. If you assume that any lights that are presently working are ok you can disconnect all the rest and start over.

One simple method; I would suggest using a small battery charger as a power source because it will provide only enough power to light the lamps. Power each circuit in turn, Start with the white to brown on the flat plug next the white to yellow and last the white to green. Have someone watch the ammeter on the charger to identify when you have a short while you reconnect wires out of sight of the charger. Disconnect wires on any circuits that shows high current one at a time till you clear the short and proceed connecting one at a time. I realize it is time consuming but it will help you clear the short circuit to ground.

Remember electricity is like water in a pipe to do work you need an "in" (B+) and an "out" (B-).

Waaaaaayyyyyyy back in school we had an instructor that would tell us that the evil geenie hidden in the wires will come out in the form of smoke if you play with his shorts

[Roger C H]

Outer Stop ( brake ) lights work
Bad News- Inner stop (brake) lights don't work

Have you thought that the inner lights may be taillights only and only the outer lights are for brakes?

[francene]

Thanks for your suggestions, Marty! I do have a charger; is the 2amp setting o.k.?

After speaking with Dana T. today, he clarified the connections for me. After taking apart the rear lights, Dana told me to see if the bulbs in the outer lights had 2 filaments; they did. So the 2 wires coming out of these lights both attach to the yellow or green trailer wire. I had all brown wires from these lights, the inner rear lights, the license plate light, and the side markers all connected together, so this is probably what caused the fuse to blow- too much load on the brown wire.

I corrected the wire connections and will test tomorrow, after I buy more #10 mini fuses!

I appreciate your input~

Fran

[francene]

Have you thought that the inner lights may be taillights only and only the outer lights are for brakes?

You are right, Roger. See above message. I spoke with Dana T. today who was so helpful.

Thank you very much for your comment. I am determined to get this straightened out and increase my understanding of electricity.

How is the camping going in the Trillium?

Fran