Towbar electrics issue

[Techie-Tech]

Hi there,

 

I’ve had a Towbar fitted to my Nissan Juke so that I can tow our little caravan about locally.

 

The issue is that when the caravan is plugged into the socket on the car, the lights on the caravan don’t work on it. Ie when the indicators etc are going on the car they’re not going on the caravan.

 

I have had 3 people with towbar a plug the caravan in and they work absolutely fine.

 

The garage response is that the Towbar electrics work fine when plugged into the MOT tester.

 

Anyone got any experiences with sort of thing?

 

Thanks

[nwkeene]

As other people have plugged their vehicles into you caravan and the caravan lights work, that seems to prove the caravan works... Have you been able to plug your vehicle into somebody else's caravan / trailer? To prove your vehicle wiring. The testers used by garages tend to be LED based, so don't draw much current and are not definitive. Some cars need special 'boxes' to keep the vehicle electrics 'happy' with the 'bulb failure' warnings etc, especially with modern LED car lighting, when using a trailer. Gone are the days of just splicing into the wiring to fit a trailer socket.

Does your caravan have LED lighting for the tail / indicator lights? or normal bulbs? It could be your car isn't 'seeing' the caravan. When its connected, is the caravan battery (if fitted) getting charged by the car engine? Does the caravan show its getting power in any way.?

[3s-gtech]

Was your towbar fitted to the car with a plug-in wiring module for the electrics, or spliced into the loom. The latter is borderline impossible on newer cars anyway, but it's possible that the caravan lights are not compatible with your car too (CANbus compatible?)