Has anyone had any luck using the trailer light wiring kit that converts your independant turn signal and brake lights on your Ranger into a single turn/brake light on the trailer? I've tried two of them in the last couple of days and both were failures. The kits I bought are mfg'd by Hoppy (Hopkins MFG) and are sold By NAPA and Grand Auto. It looks like I may wind up adding more lights to the trailer because I CAN NOT get these things to work.

Anyone have any suggestions?
Thanks in advance.

 

Did you get the box that splices in or the tee that just plugs into the harness? Go for the tee type, the convertor will be wired in already for the '93 on up Rangers.Finally,2 words of pain relief: Ground wire!
Phillip

 

I used the T adapter that just plugs in. I have the trailer plug on the Ranger grounded to the frame. What else can I do?

 

Let's start by checking the plug with a test light.Attach the clip of the light to the ground term.{the only male}of the plug.Turn on the park lights and probe the hole in the plug that is inline with the brown wire,it should light up.Now check right signal by probing the green wire,left signal by probing the yellow wire with the switch on and turn signal lever positioned accordingly.If all of this checks out,the problem lies in the trailer itself.Again,I will stress the ground wire on the trailer side!Make sure it is grounded good! I like to run my ground wire all the way to the studs that the lights mount with because of certain trailer designs like tilting tounges and lights on bolted down posts will lose ground through these movable joints{I once lost 15 minutes time finding out that I was losing ground in these places}.Another tip is to remove the bulbs and clean the sockets with a shotgun barrel brush.Keep me posted.

Phillip

 

Already been there and done that. I have completely rewired the trailer. When I powered the trailer cord with a battery, everything works fine. So I know it is properly wired and the ground is good. So tonight, I installed the third converter. This one was made by Draw-Tight, the same folks I got the receiver hitch from. Plugged it into the trucks wiring loom, hooked up the trailer, crossed my fingers, and turned on the park lamps. So far so good...but I hadn't been having problems with the tail lights. So now it is turn signal time. The left one works, and the right one doesn't. Just like the last two. Then I step on the brake pedal and there goes the fuse, just like the last two. SO, I fixed the little SOB! I cut all of the electronic crap off of the T, and rewired the plug on the truck so I have a seperate stop light circuit. Fortunately, I had installed a five wire loom on the trailer, and the trailer had dual stop/turn lamps on it already. ( I had disconnected one of the stop/turn lights on each side per the instructions on the converter box, apparently the converter can only handle one bulb) I wired up the two disconnected lamps to the stop light circuit and ALL of my troubles are gone!!! EXCEPT.....I just bought a boat today, and now I will have to add seperate stop lights to the boat trailer too.

 

Sounds like you already knew the fundamentals of trailer lights,including seperate function ones!By the way, you never mentioned what year model Ranger you have.The manufacturer of these plugs needs to be informed about this problem and your headache! They may even give you some freebies!
Phillip

 

The Ranger is a 96. I have wired dozens of trailers, large and small, (I worked in a tractor/trailer shop for 14 yrs) and have never had this sort of trouble. The whole ordeal just torques me off, especially now that I have to add extra lights to the boat trailer. I really find it hard to imagine that my Ranger is any different than any of the others that I see towing a trailer down the road. Oh well, it will all be behind me soon.

 

neil, Phillip
Okay guys, here goes, its not an answer just an incident. My 95 Ranger with the T adapter hooked up, no problem. My 96 Explorer with T adapter, no problem. Brake lights and tailights worked like they were supposed to. We hooked the trailer up to another 96 Explorer with the factory trailer wiring package and promptly blew three fuses in a row. Hooked it back up to my 96 with the T adapter and everything was fine.
Paul

 

I have a 93 not sure if wirings the same but I had to buy a converter box the also plugs into tee. I had to get one for the mazda version ranger was not in stock but have had no problems. This was a few years ago. not sure of cost or where i got it sorry.
Paul

 

I guess I have a "freak" Ranger, and the Explorer that you hooked up to was was a cousin to my little truck. I brought the boat and trailer home today, and also picked up the extra "Truck-Light" brake/tail lights so I can wire it up for the Ranger. Thank goodness my 99 Super Duty has the regular brake/turn/tail lights so I could get the boat home!!!

 

Just stumbled upon this site, folks I am having fits checking out the homebrew wiring on my trailer except instead of a Ford, am using a 93 S-10 Blazer. Seems like I blow a fuse after a short fashion of using the trailer. The blazer initially had a 4 wire plug , the previous owners of the trailer had cut off their 4 wire plug, so I just installed a new one. Today I even tried a 20 amp fuse and it went out even before getting out of our driveway. Also went to NAPA this morning to see about the flasher unit, they said I had the heavy duty unit so no need to buy theirs. Does anyone know the proper wiring on the trailer plug to the tail-lights? There must be a standard set up out there.

Thanks

 

On your standard 4-wire plug;
Brown = Tail (or running lights)
Green = Left turn and Stop
Yellow = Right turn and Stop
White = Ground

 

This may sound strange but, Wal-mart (at least the ones in N.E. Ohio) Has the wiring kits specifically for any truck. I had a '97 Ranger and the kit just plugged right in. Not being the brightest bulb in the box I didn't ground it properly the brake and turn signals worked but not the running lights. The kit I bought was about $ 38.00. Hope that helped.

ranger99