Trailer Wiring :eek:

[lurch676]

Yup, that's right; I'm building a trailer.

It's gone WAAAAAY past the planning stages now, and is actually coming into fruition, with the end date being this Friday (so we can go away to a rally with it).

But I'd like some advice. I'm doing the wiring with a standard 7 pin trailer plug (the lights are actually coming from a LED trailer board [£20 fromt he missus work]). As I'm using LED's, should I still put in relays? I was gonna use relays to avoid the hastle of "Oh no, a bulbs blown, now none of them work" and to save draw on things like the indicator circuits (so they don't flash too quickly), but as I'm using LED's, do I still need to?

Cheers guys

(There'll be a trailer thread on one of the other parts of the forum in a little while, I suspect)

Lurch.

 

[TownsendsFJR1300]

Yup, that's right; I'm building a trailer.

It's gone WAAAAAY past the planning stages now, and is actually coming into fruition, with the end date being this Friday (so we can go away to a rally with it).

But I'd like some advice. I'm doing the wiring with a standard 7 pin trailer plug (the lights are actually coming from a LED trailer board [£20 fromt he missus work]). As I'm using LED's, should I still put in relays? I was gonna use relays to avoid the hastle of "Oh no, a bulbs blown, now none of them work" and to save draw on things like the indicator circuits (so they don't flash too quickly), but as I'm using LED's, do I still need to?

Cheers guys

(There'll be a trailer thread on one of the other parts of the forum in a little while, I suspect)

Lurch.

Moisture will get in the assemblies with time. The more open electrical joints you potentially have exposed to vibration, weather, etc, the more likely a failure.

IMHO, I'd get trailer specific LED light assemblies and wire them in normally, (no relays).


When I built my trailer, I used regular light assemblies (1157 bulbs) and lubed base with di-lectric grease as those plugs and where the bulb inserts tend to rust together and cause issues...

The bulbs are original from 2007 when I built the trailer. And its been across the country several times with some big bikes


NOTE, Yamaha, for our FZ6, the STOCK tail light is an 1157 style, HOWEVER, one of the bulb filiments has THREE POSTS supporting the filiment vs the standard TWO posts (making the bulb considerably stouter). It may be a worthwhile add on should you go that route.

 

[lurch676]

Cheers!

I'm using an LED 4 function set from maypole (my partner works at their suppliers) which have stop/running/indicator/plate lights. They're sealed units so shouldn't let moisture in.

I was gonna use grease on the connections because once they're in, I can't be bothered to get them back out again or need to replace them.
The trailer is gonna live outside lol, so I need to get it as weatherproof as possible

BTW, I've based my design on the Squire D18SE that we tow with the Goldwing, only it's got one wheel less

Lurch.

 

[TownsendsFJR1300]

Are you making a PULL BEHIND the motorcycle trailer?

 

[Motogiro]

On current usage relationship, if you're just adding LEDs to the existing load you should be okay with your existing flasher.

 

[lurch676]

Are you making a PULL BEHIND the motorcycle trailer?

Yup, hence the need to know about relays from the bike etc

The base is made, and a MDF mock up is being finished tomorrow, then off to a rally on friday for first use, and again the weekend after, then it's stripping it back down and making a fibreglass mold from it.

I can pick up the entire thing with one hand at the moment, dunno what it'll be like with the body shell on.

Oh yeah, I'm using a 10" Peugeot Zenith front wheel (which has a hub brake which I'll be utilising at a later stage to have a slightly braked trailer).

 

[lurch676]

well, this weekend saw me take the (hastily built: 3 days) trailer to york for a rat rally on the back of the shiny fz...

it was fine! pulled straight and true up to speeds in excess of 120 (of course, we did this on the private road leading to the campsite...).
didn't really feel much difference in acceleration and even did an emergency brake test with it on at 50mph an couldn't tell it was there.

the only issue is that I think I made it too short... if you accelerate up to 55 she's starts fishtailing, pull through it and slow down to 60 again and she's fine. i think I'll lengthen the tongue to make it wobble less.

Having put this together hastily, the mount wasn't up to much so i spent friday bracing the swingarm mount with twice as much 20x20x1.5mm square section, but there's still play in the up/down pivots, so it rocked a little (didnt bounce and hardly felt it) once I've sorted this, i reckon she'll be fine. She didn't try and pull me over in corners or anything like that, and I even got orders for 3 more!!!

So i reckon that prototype 1 was a success, just need to do some work on her now, and then we can get it all sorted
:rockon:

 

[DavesFZ]

This sounds really interesting. Could you grab a few pics during the process?

 

[Motogiro]

This sounds really interesting. Could you grab a few pics during the process?

Me too! Pictures please!

 

[lurch676]

Dunno if these will be oversize...sorry if they are

I made the box purely so I could actually take some stuff with me to the rally I went to. It's a temporary thing, but I needed to test the trailer frame loaded up

this was the first swingarm mount i did - it was too flimsy and flexed alot, so it got reinforced (again, just to get to the rally, in a rush on friay morning ) , but it's getting ditched in favour of a better design I've done... here's why it needed re-inforcing... if you look closely you can see the bar's snapping behind the weld:

This was with a group of 125's (I have a 125 rat bike) that were meeting near my house on the day I was leaving. The trailer's empty (it didn't bounce) and it had a marquee side-wall "lid".

This is the 125 rat (the L plates are on 'cos I get less hastle around Nottingham with them on lol) with the trailer on the back because I needed somewhere to put the trailer when I took it off the fz6 lol


I've got a couple of pics of the build process, but I've not got them off my phone yet

 

[lurch676]

when i get round to finishing it, it'll have a re-inforced fibreglass body, and a braked wheel (I have the option for brakes now, just didn't have time to sort it out properly - it'd have to be all on or all off )