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[Marie]

hi guys, (and ladies)

Yesterday i fitted my towbar didnt take me long easy enough.  

The only problem i came across was the electrics....... when i went to do them i have found i have lost the destructions. ( Arse) this leads me to my questions

where does the wire entre the car? i beleive i need to drill another hole but where?

where do i wire it into? i have checked the boot and light clusters it looks like im going to have to splice it into the lights loom on the left hand side. is this correct? if so is there anything else i need to look for/do?

Guys can you help as i need to complete this today please.

cheers

[x25xe]

Hi and welcome to the forum.

The last two bar I fitted to a car was on my Astra some 13 years ago.  Then, I had to drill another hole to feed the wire from the 12N socket into the boot area and splice into the lighting loom at the rear of the car.

This would appear to be a logical approach here.  I know that others on here have fitted tow bars who will be able to advise better than I.  One thing though, if you are going to splice into the loom, please do not use those blue "Scotch locks" as connectors.  They are, frankly, rubbish and will soon fail.  Far better the use proper crimp connections with the correct tool to crimp them!

Don't know which tow bar you have, but you could also try searching the net for the instructions.

Good luck

[Mike Collins]

On the saloon, there is a multi pin connector hidden away behind the trim panel that runs across the rear of the boot. I would think there must be one somewhere on the estate, looking at the, very unclear, diagrams it may be behind left side trim panel.
Hopefully, someone has already done an estate.

[Marie]

i have had a look on the net and they dont have intrustions for a vauxhall omega every other model but ours.   the towbar is a tow trust model.

just had another look looks like ill be cutting into the loom. The kit came with with some sort of relay? (small box with wires coming off it) whats this for any ideas?  :-?

[cdx25]

On the saloon, there is a multi pin connector hidden away behind the trim panel that runs across the rear of the boot. I would think there must be one somewhere on the estate, looking at the, very unclear, diagrams it may be behind left side trim panel.
Hopefully, someone has already done an estate.

Dont know if your estate is the same as mine (mine is 2.5 facelift) but if it was the wiring connectors were behind the jack in the centre rear part of the spare tyre well.  There was a vauxhall multiplug on there which I cut off when I saw a) the price of the mating half and b) someone had used those awful scotchlocks (X25XE has good advice there!) which had made a mess of the wiring.  I made up a new multiplug connector and these are easy enough to acquire.

Hope this helps

Jon

[Tony H]

The relay box is probably an audible warning buzzer that is activated when you use your indicators or hazards

[Kevin Wood]

The multi-way plug for the towbar brings out exactly the same connections as are present at the light clusters with the exception of the brake light which is passed through a load sensing device to display a bulb failure warning on the MID. This device is not normally fitted to the car so you will have to locate the empty socket for this and bridge the two connections.

The other difference is that the multi-way plug has the fog light signal looped through so that the fog lights on the car can be disabled when the trailer is plugged in. I don't normally bother with this because you then can't wire up the towing connector with 7 core cable and they have a tendency to fail and stop the car fog lights working.

There are also feeds for reversing lights and a 12v permanent feed fused at 10 or 20 amps (not sure which) so that may be useful if you want a 12s socket as well.

Not sure where the multi way connector is hidden on the estate.

I don't think there'll be a problem with connecting directly to the light clusters and it saves having to look for the load sensor socket which seems to be positioned in any number of places under the dash.

The audible warning device for the indicators is probably the relay-like object you have. This should have 5 connections. Black wire goes to ground normally. A search on the internet will find some information on it, I'm sure. The other 4 wires are used to loop the indicator supply for each side through the device and it beeps (annoyingly) whenever the trailer indicators are working.

I had to drill a hole for my towing electrics on my saloon. Keep it well up under the bumper (I used the same location as the number plate wiring but on the opposite side of the car). I have a feeling there was a location already marked out for the hole.

Kevin

[Marie]

  :yDONE!!!!!  

Fitted at last. Thinkin about it it was easier then i thought it was going to be.

Just have one last question. Am i ment to do something to get my trailer light on the dash to illuminate or is this for when a caravan is fitted? does it matter if it does not come on/ dont work?

For all those who have an estate who want to fit a towbar heres some advice/ how we did the electrics.

If you remove the spare tyre in the well there is a hole with a bung in it on the rear port side. (Took me 30 mins to find this but saved drilling a hole) push the bung out with a screwdriver. then pass the wire through the hole. (we enlarged this hole slightly so we could put a gromit in it to prevent the wire chaffing against the metal)

Once you have the wire through the hole you will then need to pass/ feed the wire in the frame of the boot towards the port side of the car (sorry left/passengers side). you will need to open the access panel to the lights and place your hand in the bottom, this next bit is then done by touch. feel fo the hole in the frame (need someone with small hands) put your fingers through and feel for your wire. if you get someone to push the wire back and forth its makes life easier to grabit and feed it through.

You should now have the wire pulled through and ready to connet to the wiring in the car.

We inlined spliced ours and also fitted a junction box. To help we loosened all the cables in the area to enble us to work freely. this also ment we could trace back the wires to a more suitable place to connect the electrics.  The junction box helps when fitting the buzzer (which i found out ours was tits   :(got a new one on its way, only took me an hour of shaking my head double checking everything and fault finding to figure it out)

Hope this may help those who may need it  

[Kevin Wood]

Good news. Sounds like you're sorted. The dash light apparently requires a different flasher unit and the fitting of a bulb to the instrument panel. It's redundant if you've got a buzzer though.

Kevin

[Andy B]

Good news. Sounds like you're sorted. The dash light apparently requires a different flasher unit and the fitting of a bulb to the instrument panel. It's redundant if you've got a buzzer though.

Kevin

But £15 on a 4 pin flasher relay is worth it to get rid of the buzzer when you indicate with a trailer/caravan on.  

[Marie]

cheers kevin,

Think ill leave the light as to fit the blub i need to remove the stearing wheel to get behind the dash.  As you siad i have a buzzer.

Marie

[Andy B]

cheers kevin,

Think ill leave the light as to fit the blub i need to remove the stearing wheel to get behind the dash.  As you siad i have a buzzer.

Marie

You don't need to remove the steering wheel as Mr Haynes suggests. It will come out - honest!

[Kevin Wood]

Depends how much towing you do, I guess. My buzzer is deliberately behind all the boot trim such that I can only just hear it. For the few miles of towing I do it's a welcome reminder that I've got something on the back

A long caravan holiday would probably see the damn thing getting disabled, however, in which case the dash light is a better option.

Kevin

[Matchless]

Audible warning for trailer / caravan indicators is a legal requirement. Should sense the current flow so you know that a bulb has blown.

Most bleep in time with the indicators which is irritating, I fitted a 4 pin flasher unit which flashes the dash light IF the trailer lamp is drawing current (a positive indication) and also modified a warning buzzer to sound only if a trailer is connected AND the indicator isnt drawing current. A much better arrangement but not legal.

[Kevin Wood]

Audible warning for trailer / caravan indicators is a legal requirement. Should sense the current flow so you know that a bulb has blown.

Ah, ok. I didn't know that. I'd assumed that audible warning arose out of towbar fitters not bothering to run wiring back to a dash light.

Cheers,

Kevin