Phil Smith

Something is up with my tire trailer wiring. My turn signals work fine with the headlights off. When I turn on the lights both trailer lights blink for a right or left turn signal and the brake lights no longer work. I checked all connections - green to green, yellow to yellow, brown to brown, and white to white on trailer connector. The connections on the car look the same. Is it possible that the connector is bad. I am not a wiring genius but all the colors match.

Any ideas?

Thanks

Phil

c4cruiser

The white wire (assuming you are using a 4-wire flat plug) is a ground wire. Make sure the white wires are grounded with a screw that goes into metal on both the car side and trailer.

Yellow is for the left stop/turn lamp
Green is for the right stop/turn lamp
Brown is for the taillamps
White is the ground.

The male/female connectors should only fit one way.

Oyishdog

grounding issue...I have had the same thing on my trailer before. Also, trace all the wires to ensure nothing is split or pinched.

1ED1

brown to tag light

johninar

As said above, it's a ground problem.

Phil Smith

Thanks for the replies. I pulled the ground wire on the trailer, stripped off more of the cover and re-attached it. Pulled the ground from the frame. The company that installed the hitch used a connector for the ground and it looks fine. Still have the same issue with the turn signals and brake lights after fooling with the grounds. Guess it is back to the installer for help.

Thanks again.

Phil

Z06cool

Phil, when are you going to upgrade and get a "real" trailer... Just joking...this is Khoi - BTW. Thanks again for the instruction at VIR

Phil Smith

Khoi,

Wish I had a truck. If I had a truck then I could get a real trailer. Then I need a space to store it all. My 2 car garage is already full! As the saying goes it is a "slippery slope". It keeps growing.

I had blast riding with you VIR. Your car is awesome. You got me thinking about a cam, heads, etc.. You did an outstanding job at VIR. Hope Wally's racing line helped even more.

See you on track.

Phil

Z06cool

Slippery slope is right Life is about compromises and luckily my wife is open to that. She won't drive a truck but I got her a Durango w/Hemi which I "borrow" every now and then which hauls the open trailer with no problems. Another compromise is the open trailer rather than a nice enclosed trailer because of, well $$$ and probably need a bigger tow vehicle to be safe with a bigger enclosed trailer. I store the trailer at work so avoids storage costs...nice little perk .

Remember, the more you "tweak" the harder it is to warranty. Even if my warranty hadn't expired on the previous engine, I really doubt I could have argued my point that the cam and other mods didn't have anything to do with the blown engine.

If I could have my way, I'd do this with a C6 Z06 without needing to mod (much) and keeping under warranty. But once again, compromises are that I keep my C5 Z06 and do the best I can with it....but I guess a 402 stroker ain't that bad

I'll probably do VIR 4 days back to back with TrackDaze and then MazdaDrivers. Hope to meet you up there again

Westwopper

I had the same issue... Ground issue . I didn't see a good place to ground my wires so I put an alligator clip on the white wire and clipped it to the bumper.
then shot it with Airplane Dielectric grease.

Phil Smith

Khoi,

I passed on the extended warranty as I wasn't sure how long I would keep the car. So, I am out of warranty. Hopefully nothing goes for a while. Like you the C6 Z06 would be nice to have. Maybe a used in a year or 2 when this wears out.

I am trying to get into the Mazda event in Sept so hopefully I'll see you there!

Phil

jimmyz808

I had the same issue with my trailer when I put it together and it definitely was a grounding issue. What you want to do is grab a multimeter and set it to check continuity (you know when it beeps if you touch the leads together), then check that you have continuity all the way from the harness ground pin, back the the brackets for each light. The trailers usually don't have a ground wire, but instead have you screw the ground wire to the trailer chassis, and then expect the chassis to carry the ground back to the lights.

On mine the powder coat on the trailer pieces prevented any contact between the trailer pieces when there were bolted together, so i didn't have a ground back where the lights were attached. I had to drill some small holes in the trailer chassis at each point where the pieces bolted together, and run a small connecting wire between the pieces. Eventually I got the ground signal to make it all the way back to the light brackets and everything started working.

Phil Smith

Jimmyz808,

Thanks for the reply. This gives me something to work with. I guess the issue is really the ground on the trailer chassis. I'll run the test as you indicated.

Phil