Back up lights using tow harness

[bwbski26]

I want to hook up some back up lights using my tow harness. I need to know which wire is the 12volt source and which wire is for the backup lights. Can anyone help? Thanks.

 

[trackmur]

The factory tow harness gives you a left, a right and a park, and while I have had no problems with mine, the converter to give you combo signal/brake lamps is failure prone. You should run a wire of your own from the front for good things like an electric brake control line, a fused or breakered +12V constant power. On my own vehicle I ran a ground to the front as well.

I imagine your back up light desire stems from wanting to tow a boat with surge brakes and an electric solenoid that stops the brakes when backing up. You can probably do this manually, depending on your surge brake system, or you can find a back up light wire and connect your plug to it. Consider placing a fuse in this system.

 

[bwbski26]

I have a light kit that needs to tap the 12volt power and the wire that does the backup lights

 

[trackmur]

A possible +12V power source for you at the back is the cigar lighter circuit, presently fused at 10 amps. However, you could run +12V from a unique, fused source, switched up front by you; to the back. Personally, I feel that the less you rely on the existing systems for your own auxiliary whims, the better.

 

[1loudLX]

Agreed. Bruno definitely run your own wiring, fused of course, off the battery. For the switching, you could pull the tail light out, and tap into the reverse light wire to trigger the relay in your kit like they suggest...or mount a dedicated switch somewhere on the dash.