GMCforum: GMCnet » Trailer brake controller

Home » Public Forums » GMCnet » Trailer brake controller (Towing)

Show: Today's Messages :: Polls :: Message Navigator

Trailer brake controller [message #351478]

Mon, 20 January 2020 21:18

thigh19

Messages: 92
Registered: July 2019
Location: Vancouver Wa

Karma: 1

Member

What trailer brake controller are you guys using? Is there a wireless unit that doesn't mean you have to run wires the full length?

Report message to a moderator

Re: Trailer brake controller [message #351479 is a reply to message #351478]

Mon, 20 January 2020 21:42

RF_Burns

Messages: 2276
Registered: June 2008
Location: S. Ontario, Canada

Karma: 3

Senior Member

As someone who spent my life's work in radio communications, I would not trust an unlicenced wireless connection where failure could result in injury or death.

Unlicenced wireless equipment operates in a wild-west environment where interference is the norm. This equipment will bear a sticker with the following FCC approval statement:
FCC STATEMENT This device complies with Part 15 of the FCC Rules. Operation is subject to the following two conditions:
(1) This device may not cause harmful interference, and;
(2) This device must accept any interference received, including interference that may cause undesired operation.

Bruce Hislop
ON Canada
77PB, 455 Dick P. rebuilt, DynamicEFI EBL EFI & ESC.
1 ton front end
http://www.gmcmhphotos.com/photos/showphoto.php?photo=29001
My Staff says I never listen to them, or something like that

Report message to a moderator

Re: Trailer brake controller [message #351481 is a reply to message #351478]

Mon, 20 January 2020 22:50

Tom Lins

Messages: 372
Registered: February 2004
Location: St Augustine, FL

Karma: 1

Senior Member

thigh19 wrote on Mon, 20 January 2020 22:18

What trailer brake controller are you guys using? Is there a wireless unit that doesn't mean you have to run wires the full length?

I use a Tekonsha Prodigy RF brake controller. The main part mounts on the trailer and the 7 pin cable from the trailer plugs into it, then the 7 pin cable from the Tekonsha plugs into your motorhome. When you use it there is a small unit that you plug into your cigarette lighter. It also has a breakaway system built-in. The added benefit is that you can tow the trailer with any vehicle that is capable of pulling the trailer, just take the remote and use it in that vehicle.
I have used this for the past 10 years on multiple vehicles. Not a cheap unit but if you tow with multiple vehicles it saves from installing brake controllers in all of them.

Tom Lins
St Augustine, FL
77 GM Rear Twin, Dry Bath, 455, Aluminum Radiator Quad-Bag Suspension Solar Panel
Manuals on DVD
YOUTUBE Channel: GMC Dealer Training Tapes
http://www.bdub.net/tomlins/

Report message to a moderator

Re: Trailer brake controller [message #351486 is a reply to message #351478]

Tue, 21 January 2020 08:39

jhbridges

Messages: 8412
Registered: May 2011
Location: Braselton ga

Karma: -74

Senior Member

I'm kind of with Bruce. My current project is replacing several microwave shots which currently use unlicensed spread spectrum RF with licensed units on a different band. These ran without problems for 20+ years, but over the last couple we have had to repolarize, swap chipping codes and swap end frequencies to stay away from every business between here and there with an RF credit card machine, which wipe them out. RF interference is huge and growing. Gimme a wire Smile

--johnny

Foolish Carriage, 76 26' Eleganza(?) with beaucoup mods and add - ons. Braselton, Ga. I forgive them all, save those who hurt the dogs. They must answer to me in hell

Report message to a moderator

Re: Trailer brake controller [message #351496 is a reply to message #351478]

Tue, 21 January 2020 11:43

Carl S.

Messages: 4186
Registered: January 2009
Location: Tucson, AZ.

Karma: 13

Senior Member

I only tow one trailer (with electric brakes) with my coach, so I installed a simple Tekonsha brake controller under my dash. There is an unused blue wire in the harness that originates somewhere behind the driver's side panel and goes to the back, near the driver's side tail light, that can be used for that. I couldn't find it, or didn't know where to look for it at the time, so I ran a new one under the coach, inside the frame.

Works for me.

Carl Stouffer '75 ex Palm Beach Tucson, AZ. Chuck Aulgur Reaction Arm Disc Brakes, Quadrabags, 3.70 LSD final drive, Lenzi knuckles/hubs, Dodge Truck 16" X 8" front wheels, Rear American Eagles, Solar battery charging. GMCSJ and GMCMI member

Report message to a moderator

Re: Trailer brake controller [message #351503 is a reply to message #351486]

Tue, 21 January 2020 15:52

RF_Burns

Messages: 2276
Registered: June 2008
Location: S. Ontario, Canada

Karma: 3

Senior Member

Johnny,
Having a licensed channel doesn't give you a whole lot of protection against interference. I did a lot of Fire Department systems which you would think would have some upper hand on protection from interference. I had a licenced 900Mhz link go down about a week after it went up. Finally called in the riggers to go up and check the antenna. They radioed down that there was a 900Mhz unlicenced stick now mounted about 3 feet in front of our 900Mhz licensed dish. It was on a municipal water tower so you could not see it from the ground. I told then to removed it.

Two days later the ISP notified the Municipality and they were livid. They were more worried about the ISP than their Fire Department Dispatch... let alone the unlicensed Part 15 no interference clause.

The ISP guy had no idea that sticking an antenna in front of another antenna could cause interference on a different frequency.

That scenario happened many times, usually late on a Friday afternoon.

Unlicensed stuff is built cheap and any close by transmitter, say a Taxi, could potentially swamp your signal.

Just saying

Report message to a moderator

Re: Trailer brake controller [message #351505 is a reply to message #351478]

Tue, 21 January 2020 16:13

RF_Burns

Messages: 2276
Registered: June 2008
Location: S. Ontario, Canada

Karma: 3

Senior Member

BTW, One of the worst RF noise offenders are vehicle electronics. Every piece of electronics emits RF noise. A kids electronic toy needs to pass a higher standard than a piece of office equipment. The reason being is the Gov. doesn't want to deal with interference to radios and TV's in homes. In commercial venues not so much. However vehicle electronics are not required to pass any type of RF emission standards.

The amount of electronics in vehicles and the amount of RF interference they spew is incredible. We had lots of issues with Transit buses and agricultural equipment. The equipment manufacturers could fix it with a couple of dollars more for RF filtering on the wiring, but its not required on a $400,000 bus or a $750,000 combine so they won't do it.

So if your wireless trailer brakes failed, it maybe because of the guy planting corn in the field near you... and there isn't a damn thing you can do about it.

Report message to a moderator

Re: Trailer brake controller [message #351513 is a reply to message #351478]

Wed, 22 January 2020 08:46

JohnL455

Messages: 4447
Registered: October 2006
Location: Woodstock, IL

Karma: 12

Senior Member

The Tekonsha brand has proven 100% reliable over 12 years on my Tahoe. I have an enclosed United tandem axle car trailer and never a controller issue. The harness also provides tail/ running/ plate lamp power, brake and turn signals and aux 12V power if you want. You can add an isolator for $70 in the aux line and never worry about one vehicle or fault killing the other while parked. The aux can keep your winch or toad battery topped while driving. Science!

John Lebetski
Woodstock, IL
77 Eleganza II

Report message to a moderator

Re: Trailer brake controller [message #351536 is a reply to message #351478]

Thu, 23 January 2020 09:44

jhbridges

Messages: 8412
Registered: May 2011
Location: Braselton ga

Karma: -74

Senior Member

Bruce, we have complete control over the sites, and the dishes are high enough that ground based stuff isn't a great concern. As to 900 MHz, we dropped it when we dropped analog carriage. It worked well for decades but suddenly was opened up for part 1`5 stuff. My old 340 car had copper spark plug wires... it would wipe out everything for a block. Replace the coil with with resistance wire, and cut the noise by nearly 20Db... no longer a concern.

--johnny

Foolish Carriage, 76 26' Eleganza(?) with beaucoup mods and add - ons. Braselton, Ga. I forgive them all, save those who hurt the dogs. They must answer to me in hell

Report message to a moderator

Re: Trailer brake controller [message #351539 is a reply to message #351478]

Thu, 23 January 2020 11:54

RF_Burns

Messages: 2276
Registered: June 2008
Location: S. Ontario, Canada

Karma: 3

Senior Member

Hi Johnny
Our licensed 900Mhz stuff was in the 930-950Mhz so it was away from the unlicensed 902-920Mhz band. When the city installed wireless electric meters, they were given a licensed channel 30khz away from our 200Khz channel carrying fractional T1. They utility had to conduct tests with us for interference, but that was with just a handful for meters. Within a year it was 10's of thousands of meters... no need to say the link reliability went way down... and that was the main link to the Dispatch centre. We have now moved that system to 4.9Ghz Public Safety Band.

Small city transit department complained they could no communicate to their buses beyond about 3 blocks. We first thought it was the no-ground plane antennas for the fiberglass roofs... turned out to be the electronics in the new buses caused 40+db of desense at VHF. Eventually put them on our trunked DMR UHF system.

Its getting worse everyday!

GMC content, used the coach for a mobile office during the 4.9Gig upgrade Smile

Report message to a moderator

Re: Trailer brake controller [message #351542 is a reply to message #351478]

Thu, 23 January 2020 12:26

jhbridges

Messages: 8412
Registered: May 2011
Location: Braselton ga

Karma: -74

Senior Member

930 - 950 has several channels specifically for STL links. Either composite centered on channel or discrete a coupl hundred KHz each side of center. The discrete would go further but could get you into phasing problems between channels. These timing errors cause a loss of signal when a mono listener picks them up. We beat that by using matrixing of the two to transmit. This keeps the two in phase at the expense of a bit of separation.

--johnny

Foolish Carriage, 76 26' Eleganza(?) with beaucoup mods and add - ons. Braselton, Ga. I forgive them all, save those who hurt the dogs. They must answer to me in hell

Report message to a moderator

Re: [GMCnet] Trailer brake controller [message #351711 is a reply to message #351505]

Tue, 21 January 2020 16:33

James Hupy

Messages: 6806
Registered: May 2010

Karma: -62

Senior Member

When Nissan (Datsun) first installed EFI on the 240 Z, they had no
suppression coming or going. They were notorious for just stopping dead in
their tracks, and not restarting. After they were towed in, you would climb
in, turn the key, and they would fire right up and run as well as ever. A
scan would reveal nothing, no stored codes, nothing. So you would just
scratch your head, exclaim "Whiskey, Tango, Foxtrot", call the owner and
tell them nothing was wrong with their car, try to justify charging them
for your shop minimum. Wasn't long until you had one P.O.'d customer. Took
a model year before Datsun figured it out. Ordinary close by radio
transmissions were found to be the cause. Don't know what they did to fix
it. Some kind of shielding, I reckon.
Jim Hupy
Salem, Oregon

On Tue, Jan 21, 2020, 2:14 PM Bruce Hislop via Gmclist <
gmclist@list.gmcnet.org> wrote:

> BTW, One of the worst RF noise offenders are vehicle electronics. Every
> piece of electronics emits RF noise. A kids electronic toy needs to pass a
> higher standard than a piece of office equipment. The reason being is the
> Gov. doesn't want to deal with interference to radios and TV's in homes.
> In commercial venues not so much. However vehicle electronics are not
> required to pass any type of RF emission standards.
>
> The amount of electronics in vehicles and the amount of RF interference
> they spew is incredible. We had lots of issues with Transit buses and
> agricultural equipment. The equipment manufacturers could fix it with a
> couple of dollars more for RF filtering on the wiring, but its not required
> on
> a $400,000 bus or a $750,000 combine so they won't do it.
>
> So if your wireless trailer brakes failed, it maybe because of the guy
> planting corn in the field near you... and there isn't a damn thing you can
> do
> about it.
>
>
> --
> Bruce Hislop
> ON Canada
> 77PB, 455 Dick P. rebuilt, DynamicEFI EBL EFI & ESC.1 ton front end
> http://www.gmcmhphotos.com/photos/showphoto.php?photo=29001
> My Staff says I never listen to them, or something like that
>
> _______________________________________________
> GMCnet mailing list
> Unsubscribe or Change List Options:
> http://list.gmcnet.org/mailman/listinfo/gmclist_list.gmcnet.org
>
_______________________________________________
GMCnet mailing list
Unsubscribe or Change List Options:
http://list.gmcnet.org/mailman/listinfo/gmclist_list.gmcnet.org

Report message to a moderator

Previous Topic:	Batteries on both sides in the engine compartment?
Next Topic:	Transmission Tmp gauge - should I ? where?

Goto Forum:

-=] Back to Top [=-

Current Time: Sun May 05 01:44:28 CDT 2024

Total time taken to generate the page: 0.01373 seconds