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Best Trailer Wiring Harness Brand?

dkcwenge

dkcwenge

Mission Peak
Joined
Dec 21, 2005
Location
Fremont, CA
Moto(s)
.
A little over a year ago, I bought a Curt T-Connector

41gbYjlrIXL._SL500_AA300_.jpg


for my Subaru and one-bike trailer. I used the wiring harness and trailer probably only a total of 5-6 times. When I'm not using it, it stays inside the trunk. A week ago I hooked it up to go pick up a friend's bike and noticed that the right tail light was out. The bulb was okay. I went ahead and tested the wiring on the trailer (which is pretty straight forward). I believe the Curt connector is faulty, but haven't tested it.

what brands have you found to be the best / most reliable for car-trailer wiring harnesses?
 
meh, they're all pretty much the same. i find user/installation error to be the biggest problem.
 
yeah, unfortunately i couldnt find a fault with the trailer wiring with my multimeter. it was in good shape..

i read some reviews and two people from amazon (taken w a grain of salt though) said they had their harnesses die in 2 weeks. that could have been user error, but thought i'd ask if anyone had similar experiences.

but the connectors are really seemingly idiot-proof. it's pretty straightforward - plug and play
 
i wanted to give an update - i bought a tester and the harness seems to have crapped out on one of the blinkers, so good thing it wasnt the trailer itself (because i couldnt find fault with it). i guess i'll be buying another one!
 
dkcwenge said:
i wanted to give an update - i bought a tester and the harness seems to have crapped out on one of the blinkers, so good thing it wasnt the trailer itself (because i couldnt find fault with it). i guess i'll be buying another one!
Click to expand...

I have that exact same harness, on a 2010 Outback (pulling a 3 bike utility trailer, LOVE the Outback ;) ). I had the exact same thing happen.

There is a fuse somewhere in the trunk that is part of the Curt harness- my hitch and harness were professionally installed, so, I had to swallow my pride and go back to the installer be shown where the fuse is.
 
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I've got a Valley wiring kit. Nothing special; it works.
 
liferider said:
I have that exact same harness, on a 2010 Outback (pulling a 3 bike utility trailer, LOVE the Outback ;) ). I had the exact same thing happen.

There is a fuse somewhere in the trunk that is part of the Curt harness- my hitch and harness were professionally installed, so, I had to swallow my pride and go back to the installer be shown where the fuse is.
Click to expand...

oh! if i can just replace a fuse for a reasonably cheap cost, i would definitely go that route! if it keeps blowing, i might check out another brand...

so you say the fuse is inside of the black box? is it easy to open or get to?
 
dkcwenge said:
oh! if i can just replace a fuse for a reasonably cheap cost, i would definitely go that route! if it keeps blowing, i might check out another brand...

so you say the fuse is inside of the black box? is it easy to open or get to?
Click to expand...
It was inline - i think it's somewhere between the black box and the harness. It was inside the passenger compartment - I'd look, but my wife has the car right now ;)

BTW, I'm pretty sure my trailer blew the fuse - nothing to do with the harness - the harness was actually protecting itself.
 
FWIW, I think most of these are simple devices with mainly a handful of diodes and maybe fuses in them. Beyond that, the differences are prolly going to be in mainly the quality control and the quality of the supplied instructions.

I wound up making one of my own in college and shoved all of the diodes into a plastic film can.
 
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