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hampstead38 · 02-10-2009, 08:15 AM

I was thinking about roadside emergencies and visibility the other day and wondered... what if a person wired two of the front and two of the rear marker lights differently? Would a turn be a bit more obvious if you had upper lights blinking? Would the blinking be more noticeable in a disabled vehicle situation. I like having marker lights but it seems to me that the could do a bit more.

LJH · 02-10-2009, 08:37 AM

That's a very good idea. Could wirers be fished from the taillights to the markers without taking off the inside panels?

**moosetags** · 02-10-2009, 09:05 AM

The clearance lights on your Aistream could probably be hooked to an automotive flasher unit. This would cause your clearance lights to flash on and off. They would not go from dull to bright like the tail light because the clearance light have a single element bulb. To change these bulbs to double element would require a complete rewire.

Brian

Johnco · 02-10-2009, 09:08 AM

I know this won't help with the turn signals, but you can take a standard flasher unit (the old ones with two prongs) and place it in your harness connector and it will flash marker, tail and license lights off of the battery in the trailer. I'd have to get the plug in front of me to tell you which two slots to put the flasher into, but the prongs fit perfectly and I seem to recall they are the ones at the top of the plug.

hampstead38 · 02-10-2009, 09:19 AM

I'm committed to the rewiring. I don't have a problem with double wiring the marker lights, but I'm switching from incandescent to LED. I'm also not committed to the OEM oval shaped marker lights. I have thought about going with larger, round lights. Once I have double wires to the appropriate corner lights, I should be "golden" on finding an LED fixture that works.

Mexray · 02-10-2009, 12:39 PM

Hampstead38...

A word of caution when changing your marker lights to LED units...

Do ONE light at a time, wire it and remount, then turn on the tail light circuit to confirm that the new light is working.

Install the next LED unit, and check all the lights again, etc, etc..

I didn't think of doing this at the time, and changed all of mine with new LED units at once, and when I turned them on, found that my tail light circuit was now 'shorted' out and blew the fuse!!!

All my running lights worked fine before I changed them out with LED units...I suspect one of the wires behind a running light came loose and is shorting out against the skin...bummer.

I still haven't found the 'short'...getting to the back of all the running lights is a MAJOR project...!

IF I'd done as suggested above, at least I would have know where the 'short' was, and could fix it accordingly!

Good Luck.

Mexray · 02-10-2009, 12:45 PM

That 'flashing' running light option sounds like a great idea...

I believe one could take a spare 7-way plug that fits into the trailer, and wire a 'flasher' into it on the cable end, using the 'Pos' battery connector from the trailer, to the 'tail light' circuit connector.

You could just plug this special 7-way into your trailer to get the lights to flash...pull it out when you're done!

If you have LED running lights and tail lights, your trailer battery bank will 'flash' these light for a mighty long time!

I'm going to make one of these special plugs when I get my LED marker lights up and running again!!!

Minnie's Mate · 02-10-2009, 01:14 PM

For those that are interested in flashing lights while parked and are concerned with draining battery (such as boondocking or emergency parking by the roadside) CW sells a battery powered unit that you plug the umbilical cord into and you have the option of the running and tail lights staying on or flashing. This way you don't drain your house batteries. It runs about $50, but one of our forum members got creative and built a similar unit that doesn't have the battery for about $10 less...I personally would go for the store bought unit with the battery, but that's just me with my lack of craft skills.

hampstead38 · 02-10-2009, 01:24 PM

Thanks for the advice and some interesting ideas. I popped on temporary marker lights for our trip south... $2 incandescent specials at Wal-Mart. The front markers still had good (hot) wires to them. The rear markers were dead so I ran dedicated wires from the pigtail into the coach and to the rear. Not pretty, but it worked well enough for the trip. When I was putting in the temporary markers, I did everything one step at a time. I've spent time chasing ghosts shorts and know how elusive they can be.

87MH · 02-10-2009, 01:36 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by hampstead38

I was thinking about roadside emergencies and visibility the other day and wondered... what if a person wired two of the front and two of the rear marker lights differently? Would a turn be a bit more obvious if you had upper lights blinking? Would the blinking be more noticeable in a disabled vehicle situation. I like having marker lights but it seems to me that the could do a bit more.

Hamp:

You might want to check the DOT requirements of the states you plan to travel in....the lights on travel trailers are a composite of all states DOT requirements (and Canada).

I do not know the legality of adding additional lights, but I do not think you would be strictly legal in all states if you remove or rewire portions of the existing light system.

ROBERTSUNRUS · 02-10-2009, 08:57 PM

Hi, this is what I made, but you can buy something similar for less than I spent makeing this, in parts.

vhord · 02-11-2009, 09:20 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Johnco

I know this won't help with the turn signals, but you can take a standard flasher unit (the old ones with two prongs) and place it in your harness connector and it will flash marker, tail and license lights off of the battery in the trailer. I'd have to get the plug in front of me to tell you which two slots to put the flasher into, but the prongs fit perfectly and I seem to recall they are the ones at the top of the plug.

Here is an article from RVBasics.com which explains this procedure well.