Itasca Center Brake Light Replacement?

[murraymcleod]

I have a 2003 Itasca Sunova 27 and the rear center brake light (which is a red LED strip about 10 inches long) was only partially working (only half would light up). I bought a new one online as a replacement, but when I took off the old light, I found that there was very little slack in its attachment wires.

There was only about 3 inches of wire sticking out after I cut off the old light, so I pulled (gently?) on the wires to see if I could get more to work with, and (you guessed it!) one of the wires pulled out of what appeared to be a crimp connector inside the wall of the MH. Now that wire is inaccessible.

I tried drilling another 1/2" hole where I thought the wires were, but was unsuccessfull in finding the end of the wire. It looks as though once through the fiberglass shell, there are two layer of plywood, and the wires seem to be routed between the two layers of wood.

So I put the old light back on to cover the holes, and caulked it well to keep moisture out. Other than doing more exploratory drilling and peppering the back of my MH with holes, does anyone know of a good way to get to the wires that power that light on the back of the MH (other than going down to the hitch brake wires)? Thanks!

On another issue, anyone know how to add a signature to my posts? I don't see where to add a profile signature like most posters on this board use....

[TNGW1500SE]

murraymcleod wrote:

TNGW1500SE wrote:

murraymcleod wrote:
I found the wire was easily accessible behind the headboard of the bed! Had to remove and re-glue the headboard back to the wall, but no big deal.

I was going to tell you that but you found it on your own.

Wish you had said something, cause as you can see it took me a year to figure this out!

LOL. I didn't notice the date of your first post.

[murraymcleod]

TNGW1500SE wrote:

murraymcleod wrote:
I found the wire was easily accessible behind the headboard of the bed! Had to remove and re-glue the headboard back to the wall, but no big deal.

I was going to tell you that but you found it on your own.

Wish you had said something, cause as you can see it took me a year to figure this out!

[tderonne]

Great job!

[TNGW1500SE]

murraymcleod wrote:
I found the wire was easily accessible behind the headboard of the bed! Had to remove and re-glue the headboard back to the wall, but no big deal.

I was going to tell you that but you found it on your own.

[murraymcleod]

I found the wire was easily accessible behind the headboard of the bed! Had to remove and re-glue the headboard back to the wall, but no big deal.

[SCVJeff]

Find someone with a snake camera. Mine came from home depot and comes with a wire hook

[DrewE]

If the wires are available around the hitch and free to be pulled, I would be tempted to pull new wires down to there and make the joint at that point. It might work best to pull a string with the existing wire and use that to pull the new one if you don't have access to an electrician's fish tape or two.

The goal here would be to avoid having a crimped joint in the middle of the wall and to avoid putting too many holes in same.

To be honest, though, I must admit that I created the potential for a similar problem for myself down the road when redoing structure around the front clearance lights of my rig. At least I'll know where to make holes to get at things, assuming my memory serves me....

[tderonne]

I would think you could drop a fish tape/wire down the hole and pull new wires up. Or use the one wire you do have to pull some fresh wire. Might be some sealant where the hole comes out the bottom, but that could easily be removed and redone when you're finished.

[murraymcleod]

Thanks. I hadn't seen that diagram (I'll need to see what other diagrams are available there!). So now I know where to drill holes to find the wires (under the fixture I guess), but I'm wondering if fixing this light would be worth the trouble of having to cover and seal whatever holes I drill! Guess I could stick some sort of decal or flag sticker over the sealed holes!

[tderonne]

Did you review the wiring installation diagram?

Looks like the wires just run straight down, should be able to find them above the hitch.