New to boating, have some trailer light questions

[Coastal Rick]

Got an little old boat and old trailer a few weeks ago and have been getting it ready to go. The trailer is steel and pretty rusty, the wiring was spliced all over the place, and the lights themselves were shoddy, not working, and not up to legal standards. So I bought a new trailer light kit with wiring and rewired it all, put the new lights on. My vehicle is an 87 toyota pu, 2wd. The vehicle side has a new plug harness with a converter for the signals that I installed a few weeks ago.Here's are some issues:

Lights seem a bit dim overall to me.
With turn signal on, the opposite side seems to slightly dim in sync.
With turn signal going it has a normal flashing rate, but if I have turn signal on and apply the brakes, the flashing rate speeds up.

Thanks for any answers or explanations you can provide.

 

[woosterken]

Re: New to boating, have some trailer light questions

well , you say the trailer is a little rusty, first , i would clean the mounting points for the lites to bare metal,run a ground wire to each lite.
as for the flasher, change it for a heavy duty electronic one
and you should be good to go

woosterken

 

[Bondo]

Re: New to boating, have some trailer light questions

Lights seem a bit dim overall to me.
With turn signal on, the opposite side seems to slightly dim in sync.
With turn signal going it has a normal flashing rate, but if I have turn signal on and apply the brakes, the flashing rate speeds up.

Ayuh,...

Problem #1,... Bad Ground...
Problem #2,... Bad Ground...
Problem #3,... Bad Ground...

 

[bruceb58]

Re: New to boating, have some trailer light questions

well , you say the trailer is a little rusty, first , i would clean the mounting points for the lites to bare metal,run a ground wire to each lite.

If you clean the mounting points to bare metal, that is all you need to worry about. Running a separate ground to each light is unnecessary.

 

[Coastal Rick]

Re: New to boating, have some trailer light questions

Ok, will do on getting the ground situation worked out. And if the flasher problem continues, then I"ll see about getting a better relay/flasher.

Do you just go to an autoparts store and just ask for a heavy duty flasher?

Thanks for previous responses!

 

[Bondo]

Re: New to boating, have some trailer light questions

Do you just go to an autoparts store and just ask for a heavy duty flasher?

Ayuh,... They come in 2 pin, or 3 pin... Pull your's to see what you need...