Trailer Plug Won't Stay In

For want of a nail....

Spend some time on close inspection first. I consider that the first rule of troubleshooting - LOOK AT IT. If you have to spend some money, consider it cheap insurance. If a failure occurs while under way, Murphy's Law clearly says it will happen at the worst time and location. Don't take the risk.

Ditto...fix it or replace

Connectors of this type are designed to mate repeatedly

First check out if there is something 'in' there, or worn bit of plastic

If me, I'd replace as DE and others recommends. If you are not handy
in this area, then any trailer/UHaul/etc can also do the replacement

On this type of thing, I'd not spare pennies and get the better one.
They all have have the same form factor, as that is an industry standard

I have to agree with donn0128, fix it or replace it. No one has suggested fixing it, so I will. Take the vehicle socket(male)and disconnect it from the vehicle and the cable, then take the cable plug(female) and disconnect it from the trailer. Now sit down at your work bench or any well lit place and plug the two parts together and try and observe where the problem is. Often it is a lousy casting or a socket or maybe a foreign object in one of the sockets in the trailer plug. There is something wrong with one of the two mating parts. If your truck came with the seven wire connector and the trailer with another brand, could be they weren't meant to mate.

And yes in my 60 years working mostly in the electrical field, I have run across this problem more than once where there is no "Written Standard" like the NEC. Even in the four wire flat connectors, there is a huge difference in plug ends.

I'd take both ends to NAPA or U-Haul or some company that has several makes of connectors and try and mate up one of the connectors to a new one. It may require spending some of your hard earned money but those bungies cords or what ever it is you jerry rig your connection weren't free.

By the way we're talking about less than twenty dollars and in most cases less than ten.

I just see no reason to micky mouse things when there are safe plausable ways of doing things. If you choose to do something unsafe and put yourself at risk, go ahead. Just let the rest of us know what roads you will be on so we can avoid them when your there. Have you ever had the umbelicable cord come loose and had to panic stop with only the TV service brakes?

Why spend money needlessly if a bungee cord or another "silly makeshift repair" does the job.

Instead of bungee cords or some other silly make shift repairs, why not simply go out and buy new cord end and receptacle and replace both with new high quality parts?

I had similar problems with my newer truck trailer connector. My 2004 model Truck the lid almost snapped down on the top of the 7-way connection and made a real firm lock on it. My 2010 model truck doesn't do that as well. It goes in ok but doesn't have that real solid snap when I lock it in place with the connector lid.

I ended up wrapping some stretch cord around the cable and hooking both ends into the truck bumper to make sure it doesn't fall out...

Roy Ken

You might consider getting a test plug with the LEDs on it. They are cheap and come in handy for checking the tow vehicle receptacle and in this case can serve double duty as it will tell you whether your problem is with the plug or receptacle by whether it seats properly.

We wrap a velcro strap around the plug and recepticle cover on ours.

Don't know but you might try spraying both sides with something like Corrosion X.