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What did you do to your boat today?


HewesYourDaddy

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On 11/17/2021 at 12:12 PM, SouthernWake said:

Thanks everyone, went out this morning and welcomed her to the marshes of SC with a dozen or so reds on fly by myself with the dog. Really impressed with this boat across many categories.

 

now the tough part of selling my old one.

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That's such a cool video. Thanks for sharing that!

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I have an ongoing battle with trailer lights.   For the first 10 years of my boating life, I simply ignored them - not a single trailer I owned had a full set of working trailer lights.   

But, eventually, I amended my ways.  Now it drives me nuts to have a light out, but its an constant, aggravating battle.   Between wiring that goes bad, connections that break, and lights that go out, keeping all the lights on is an exercise in frustration, but one I've been religiously maintaining.   I trailer a lot before dawn and don't want to kill anyone.

Then after all that, you go to the boat ramp and some jack-a-ninny clips your trailer and drives off.   So, to the frickin' a-hole in the blue BMW who was parked in a HANDICAPPED BOAT TRAILER SPOT besides me at the CB state park marina, I hope my trailer scratched the hell out of your paint job.   Oh, and thanks for the note . . . oh wait, you didn't leave one.   

Seriously, it's 37 bucks for a new light kit, I can afford it, but a note would have been nice.   And I know that the guy knew he did it because he ever-so-kindly tried to hide the incident by "re-mounting" my broken light to the trailer before driving off.  Had it not been for my license plate sitting on the ground, I wouldn't have known what happened till later.   

What's wrong with people?

 

 

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1 hour ago, whichwaysup said:

What's wrong with people?

Dis-functional parenting.

Sorry for your troubles Gus.  I kept blowing bulbs on my trailer or they wouldn't work right.  Found two things wrong.  The trailer ground wire (white wire) has to be well attached to the trailer frame, and also connected properly to the ground pin on the plug-in on your towing vehicle.  The other thing I found was a short in one of the tail lights on the towing vehicle.  The screw that holds the tail light lens in place went through the bundle of wires when the wire bundle was not moved out of the way of the screw hole when reattaching after changing a bulb.  I separated the wires where the screw nicked them and wrapped each one individually with electrical tape to fix the short.  Hope this helps

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Hopefully scratch is beyond the TV miracle eraser. 

On a note about trailer  lighting. Today's  LED lights are  very susceptible  to bad grounds.

Over the years I  finally went to eliminating the trailer  as my ground  source and run a dedicated ground to  each light.

The easiest way is to place  a plastic junction box on the trailer  such that it does not  get submerged. 

Run the plug wires into box. Now from each wire you can easily run the appropriate wire to the light.

Troubleshooting down the road  is easy as you have total access to each end.

 

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3 hours ago, smilemaker said:

Hopefully scratch is beyond the TV miracle eraser. 

On a note about trailer  lighting. Today's  LED lights are  very susceptible  to bad grounds.

Over the years I  finally went to eliminating the trailer  as my ground  source and run a dedicated ground to  each light.

The easiest way is to place  a plastic junction box on the trailer  such that it does not  get submerged. 

Run the plug wires into box. Now from each wire you can easily run the appropriate wire to the light.

Troubleshooting down the road  is easy as you have total access to each end.

 

best way to do it....

dc

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9 hours ago, smilemaker said:

Over the years I  finally went to eliminating the trailer  as my ground  source and run a dedicated ground to  each light.

The easiest way is to place  a plastic junction box on the trailer  such that it does not  get submerged. 

Run the plug wires into box. Now from each wire you can easily run the appropriate wire to the light.

Troubleshooting down the road  is easy as you have total access to each end.

This is great advice and have done this myself. But what else I did, after reading it on this forum, was I went with some fairly inexpensive extension cords and used those as my trailing lighting wires. Obviously not the same colors but you just have to know the colors and how they are connected. It is doubled sheathed for extra protection, waterproof, just make sure the connections are done properly.

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Muddybottom

I  have heard of people  using extension chord but I  prefer to use a tinned wire for anything marine. 

I  use a duplex wire with 2 or 4 wires. This also gives that extra layer of abrasion protection. Costs more than extension chord but the tinned wire is better for salt water.

Much has been said on connections but you  can't beat a good heat shrink butt connector slathered with liquid  electrical tape and then encased by heat shrink tube about an inch passed the connector.

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10 hours ago, smilemaker said:

Hopefully scratch is beyond the TV miracle eraser. 

On a note about trailer  lighting. Today's  LED lights are  very susceptible  to bad grounds.

Over the years I  finally went to eliminating the trailer  as my ground  source and run a dedicated ground to  each light.

The easiest way is to place  a plastic junction box on the trailer  such that it does not  get submerged. 

Run the plug wires into box. Now from each wire you can easily run the appropriate wire to the light.

Troubleshooting down the road  is easy as you have total access to each end.

 

You have a pic of this?  Going to have to rewire the trailer and might consider this.   

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52 minutes ago, smilemaker said:

I  use a duplex wire with 2 or 4 wires. This also gives that extra layer of abrasion protection. Costs more than extension chord but the tinned wire is better for salt water.

  Absolutely, the tinned is better but with the cost of wire these days trailer lights can be pretty expensive using it. But again as you mentioned the connections are key using proper heat shrink or the 5200 and then the heat shrink is key.

  As mentioned though this was the absolute best trailer wiring I had and never had to mess with it for years!

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sorry also Gus about all the troubles you are encountering.  I backed into a trailer once left the guy a note and offered to replace his tandem trailer fender.  he said no way, I was the first one to ever leave a note...he said not to worry about it. I did bend it back and almost got it back inplace...any who on to trailer lights, I have not had the issues you are having as freshwater isn't as rough on the trailer like old salty is........hope you figure it out....

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I also can NOT stand a non working trailer light. I have several work boats and a couple pleasure. Constantly battle with the work boats. Couple weeks ago i pulled the pathfinder and noticed one side of the trailers marker lights were out, almost immediately replaced but noticed that the wires were mighty brittle, looks like a complete rewire is in the near future.

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I rewired my trailer I'm guessing about 7 or 8 years ago using one of those trailer wiring harnesses.  Wire was not tinned, but I ran a separate ground to every light and haven't had any problems since other than a the clearance light bar going bad.  All other lights still function as they should.

 

The keys for me are independent grounds to each light (ran them from a bus bar I riveted to my trailer), and avoid splicing anything that will get dunked. 

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Got a little work done on the trailer.  Finally added the centering bunks with my boys help.  Used them yesterday and they made a big difference.  Also rewired the trailer using an extra wiring harness I had, thought about going fancy with extension cords, boxes, etc, but didn’t have the equipment.   Was rewarded for my efforts with precisely ONE working light after I finished.   🤪   Apparently I have a ground issue. New trailer lights arrived so will put those on and address the ground today.  

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