Trailer Lights Plug

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borahshadow

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I've been noticing that about every gmt-400 that I see that has been wired for towing has the plug in a different spot. haha I was just wondering if there is any way it was done factory or if everything I've seen is after market stuff.

My truck has the little round 6 pin plug (it is six right?) and it's mounted in the square tube that is part of the hitch receiver. here are some of the ways I've seen them mounted
  • Like mine in the hitch
  • in the bumper where the left licence plate light normally is
  • with a L bracket that was just screwed to the bottom of the bumper
  • just hanging there lol

I've seen both 6 pin plugs and the 7 pin RV plugs mounted in all of the above places. Is there any "normal" or factory spot/way it's done or does every shop that installs things like that do it differently? I've also seen trucks with both the 6 pin and the 7 pin plugs so they don't have to use adapters.
 

Mean Green

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I personally have 7 round RV mounted right beside my receiver hitch. Its a perfect location IMO, i'll see if i can find a picture.. As far as where to mount it, it's really just preferance. Any of them that i install, i usually mount them beside the receiver hitch so it blends in nice and doesn't stick out or anything. As far as them coming factory, i don't think so. My truck has the towing package, and just had the wires ran and didn't have the plug. I personally haven't seen any GMT400's that came factory with the plug, maybe they came factory on GMT400 3500's?

Edit: Here's the best picture i have of it:

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borahshadow

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I like that location it looks clean. I like where my 6 pin in mounted too. I don't think I have a picture but I could get one later. Whoever installed it must have drilled a hole in the square tube to mount it. It is mounted right about where that sticker with the tow ratings is that you can just barely see in your picture... I don't have one of those stickers.

Maybe I'll add a 7 pin just like yours and then I'll have both and I won't have to use adapters or possibly drill a bigger hole to replace the smaller 6 pin I've got... That sounds pretty good :)
 

dcZ71

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i dunno this is mine

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borahshadow

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6 pin is pretty useless IMO... the only thing I have seen with a 6 lately is a horse trailer

3 out of the 4 trailers that I own have a 6 pin plug... A home built utility trailer, a 2 place snowmobile trailer, and the horse trailer. The RV is the only one with the 7 pin. So it's not useless to me unless I wired a new plug on 3 of my trailers.
 

Sully

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they older trailers? Most trailers are either a 4 or 5 flat or a 7 way... atleast that I have seen. Im not trying to be a dick, but it seems with a 7way you can plug into anything
 

Mean Green

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they older trailers? Most trailers are either a 4 or 5 flat or a 7 way... atleast that I have seen. Im not trying to be a dick, but it seems with a 7way you can plug into anything

Personally I have converted all my trailers to the 7 way. It's really nice to have an AUX wire for the trailer!
 

borahshadow

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they older trailers? Most trailers are either a 4 or 5 flat or a 7 way... atleast that I have seen. Im not trying to be a dick, but it seems with a 7way you can plug into anything

I got thinking about it and I realized that only one of the trailers actually came with the 6 pin plug... That was the horse trailer. The home built utility trailer I wired up the 6 pin on it since that is what the other trailers (except the rv) used and I just now remembered that I actually converted the sled trailer from a 4 pin to a 6 pin. It's just one of those things where I had a 6 pin plug on the truck and I keep an adapter in the burb so 6 pin was the natural choice to use for the 2 trailers that I had a choice on *shrug*

I can agree that the 7 pin is sort of the Chuck Norris of all the plug options but here is my dilemma... Like I said whoever installed the trailer plug must have drilled a hole in the square tube that makes up the hitch. I don't think it is a big enough hole to have cause or cause any problems with the strength. But if I was to want to convert my truck to a 7 pin I would have to drill a hole that was quite a bit bigger to put the plug there. My only other option would be to just leave the 6 pin there and mount a 7 pin to the side like Mean Green has done. I haven't ever had a super pressing need to pull the RV with my truck instead of the burb but if a time came that I needed/wanted to I would hate to have to wire up the plug right then lol

Mean Green said:
Personally I have converted all my trailers to the 7 way. It's really nice to have an AUX wire for the trailer!
I guess I never realized that I didn't have an aux wire going to the trailer... I could have sworn that the brakes and the orange aux wire were wired into the plug. Is that not possible with the 6 way? It seems that if you could get all the lights with a 4 way then a 6 way would have 2 extra pins that could be used for brakes and aux. I guess I'm just a little confused now.


Wow my all my posts seem to be long and wordy lately! lol
 

Sully

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5th pin is normally back up lights, 6th pin is brakes, 7th is a battery charging for rvs ans such but can be used as an aux like he said.
 
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