NONE of my LED trailer lights work?

[pcrussell50]

Any tricks to LED trailer lights? I just bought a nice used boat, with a very nice, used trailer that has LED lighting. When I plugged it into my tow vehicle's flat connector, not a _single_ light lit up. Is there some kind of ballast, or voltage conditioner for LED lights, or most likely a bad ground, like you might suspect for regular lights when none of them work?

-peter

 

[109jb]

Re: NONE of my LED trailer lights work?

Check the ground. If none are working then that is the common link.

 

[642mx]

Re: NONE of my LED trailer lights work?

Any tricks to LED trailer lights? I just bought a nice used boat, with a very nice, used trailer that has LED lighting. When I plugged it into my tow vehicle's flat connector, not a _single_ light lit up. Is there some kind of ballast, or voltage conditioner for LED lights, or most likely a bad ground, like you might suspect for regular lights when none of them work?

-peter

Check the fuse in the tow vehicle first, then the mostlikely suspect is the ground.

 

[foodfisher]

Re: NONE of my LED trailer lights work?

Corrosion at connector. Had to wiggle mine a lot to get power through.

 

[Bifflefan]

Re: NONE of my LED trailer lights work?

Start with your tow vehicle, check the power and grounds. If good move on to the trailer wiring and grounds. You really need to have a ground wire to make things work, 98% (im guessing of course) of all lighting issues is a bad ground.

 

[ghamby]

Re: NONE of my LED trailer lights work?

polarity counts with LEDs

 

[pcrussell50]

Re: NONE of my LED trailer lights work?

polarity counts with LEDs

fascinating! i'll have to consider that too, when i get to troubleshooting.

-peter

 

[sethjon]

Re: NONE of my LED trailer lights work?

90% of the time its the ground. Check to make sure the trailer is properly grounded first.

 

[pcrussell50]

SOLVED: NONE of my LED trailer lights work?

SOLVED: NONE of my LED trailer lights work?

it was a bad ground... of course...

long version: it was a 100% bad ground in fact. the ground wire in the trailer harness is attached to the trailer with a ring terminal and a self-tapping screw. the guy who built the trailer, [and restored the boat] was super detail oriented. he had soldered and shrink-wrapped every connection. well he hadn't shrink wrapped the ring terminal where it attached to the trailer, perhaps because if it grounded against the trailer, so what? anyway, the soldered area was well penetrated... and therefore, brittle. the wire broke off completely in a brittle fracture, right where it enters the ring terminal. this was a case where conscientiousness was misapplied, i guess. then again, maybe i snapped it off myself by carelessly swinging a safety chain into it?

anyhow, i crimped on a new ring terminal, without solder this time, [my typical shoddy workmanship], and it all works great now.

-peter

 

[Treager]

Re: NONE of my LED trailer lights work?

Agree with above, just going to offer another opinion:
I prefer to use a dedicated wire ground with LEDs on trailer lights. Even though the trailer is usually good enough to get past the bias voltage, there is always going to differences in voltage at different grounding points (I would be surprised to see up to a 1/2 volt difference on the trailer and battery ground) and would prefer to have the highest voltage difference to ground for maximum LED brightness. (Plus you minimize that ground point changing over time due to corrosion)...

 

[Mr Crabbs]

Re: NONE of my LED trailer lights work?

polarity counts with LEDs

Not with mine.

 

[ghamby]

Re: NONE of my LED trailer lights work?

Very interesting. What brand of light. Post a pic. In all my experience with diodes, they were polarity sensitive. They blocked current one way and passed
it the other.
http://www.etrailer.com/question-12496.html

I think I answered my own question. I stand corrected.

 

[Mr Crabbs]

Re: NONE of my LED trailer lights work?

No problem, technology marches on.

 

[ghamby]

Re: NONE of my LED trailer lights work?

I looked further at e trailer and almost all their LED fixtures come with a polarized wiring harness. The scientific references all indicate LEDs are polarized. These fixtures that will light either way must have circuitry that
corrects for reversed polarity.