Brake Controller Installation Instructions And Wire Colors for a 2005 Toyota 4Runner

Question:

wire colors on Draw-tite Activator II do not match colors on vehicle supplied harness. Can you help with this?

asked by: Dave W

Expert Reply:

The wire colors for the brake controller are white ground wire, black power wire, red brake switch wire and blue brake feed wire that goes to the trailer brakes, see video links.

Your 2005 Toyota 4Runner should have a connection point under the dash near the emergency brake pedal that the 20265, wiring harness will plug into, if your vehicle was set up with the factory tow package wiring.

If this connector was removed for some reason and you need to splice the Draw-Tite Brake Controller, # 5504, to the factory wiring the plug was removed from, you will need to use a circuit tester, # PTW2993, to determine the correct wires to splice to. With the circuit tester you should find one wire with constant 12-volt power, one wire with power only when the brake pedal is pressed, and a wire that will send power back to the factory 7-Way connector. The remaining wire should be a ground wire. As a general rule Toyota uses the following wire colors, but they change wire colors between vehicles, model years and sometimes within model years so testing is the only sure way to wire correctly.

Black with Red Tracer = 12 volt Power
Green with White Tracer = Stoplight
Brown = Ground
Red = Trailer Brakes

If your vehicle is not equipped with factory tow package wiring, you will need to hardwire the brake controller for proper operation. In this case you will start with a working 4-Way connector, if one is not already present. For the 2005 Toyota 4Runner you would use part # 119178KIT.

You would then use the Electric Brake Controller Installation Kit, # ETBC7, to run the additional wires for the brake controller and install a 7 and 4-Way connector at the rear of the 4Runner.

Finally, you will wire the brake controller in the cab of the vehicle. I have included a link to detailed installation instructions for wiring this kit and videos showing how to wire with the factory tow package and without.