Trailer Wiring Nightmare

A few weeks ago @scarletreaper pointed out that one of the tail lights on our camper wasn't working. I knew it could be as simple as the bulb being out, but I also knew that the wiring leading to the hitch was a mess and could be a source of the problem.

I decided to check the fuses as well and discovered that the 10amp fuse that protects the trouble tail light circuit was out. This is usually caused by a short in the circuit which led me back to wiring near the hitch.

There was about 50' of excess wiring, some new and some old, near the hitch. The ground wire was cut or damaged in several places, and the other wires were spliced in random places. Since there was several feet of good new wiring to salvage, I unraveled it and separated the wires to use later.

Just identifying which wire went where was a challenge, but thankfully it was only a 4 wire system. After cutting out all the excess wire, I left about 5-6' which is still plenty more than you need to hook up to the truck. There's about 20' of new wire left if I ever need it.

After getting everything spliced together I found that we do need some bulbs for the camper,but the blinker and tail lights are working. I'll need to get some silicone to caulk around the lens covers as well when I go to replace them. This should be much easier than the wiring mess though.