Troubleshooting Bad Lighting Ground on 30-Foot Hillsboro Gooseneck Trailer

Question:

I am using a 1999 hillsboro 30 ft gooseneck and all the lights worked and functioned normally except the passenger side tail light I fixed that by regrounding the light to the frame. When I did this now the driver side turn signal and brake light do not work. Any suggestions

asked by: Dalton Q

Expert Reply:

If a trailer's main ground connection is not strong enough to allow all lights to operate sometimes adding an additional ground jumper right at a specific light, as you did, will remedy the problem but it can also cause it to move to a new light, the light that now has the worst ground connection.

This ground jumper is usually the fix for lights that use their mounting studs for ground and on trailers that may have corrosion, grease or lots of paint at the main grounding point on the frame.

You can try adding an additional ground to the other light as you did before, or you can find the main trailer harness ground and relocate its ground wire to a new bare metal spot on the trailer's frame. Sanding off the primer/paint can also help a lot in making good metal to metal contact.

Once you get your ground sorted out you can protect it with an application of dielectric grease like # 11755.

expert reply by: Adam R