13 pin lighting problem

[Ricey]

Hi, grateful for any advice.

Had a towbar fitted to our new car today with 13 pin electrics to match the caravan (used a professional fitter). Leaving tomorrow on holiday, plugged it in earlier this evening to check and the lights on the caravan don't work properly. When i turn on the car side lights the fog light comes on by itself (i.e. when not switched on manually) and the caravan tail lights are really dull. When indicating the side lights and indicator on the van both 'pulse' rather than flash. With no side lights turned on I have the basic lights (brake and indicators), although they are dimmer than normal.

Prior to the new car we towed using a single 12N on the car with a 13pin adapter and had no problem with the lights, so i'm pretty sure it's a 'car' problem rather than a van problem.

I will be phoning the fitter tomorrow but given that we're off on holiday tomorrow i doubt if it will be fixed before we go.

I know it's short notice but any advice on whether or not it's likely to be a simple fix that I could quickly do myself in the morning would be appreciated. Admittedly i'm not particularly knowledgable about electrics, but thought i'd take the chance and ask anyway.

Thanks in advance.

 

[Stephen1956]

Looks like the earth is not connected correctly on the car

 

[mistralse]

Hi,yes it does sound like the earth wire.the lights are finding their own earth through the rev lamp,Denis

PS you wont be going anywhere if you dont get them fixed,lights and indicators are essential when towing as i'm sure you know.

 

[Ricey]

Thanks for the posts. I cleaned up the earth contact on the car by rubbing away the paintwork with abrasive paper, but to no avail. Spoke to the fitter and he was baffled by the problem, but did explain that it sounded like a wiring problem in the caravan plug creating a circuit of it's own. A quick check of the caravan plug showed that at least 3 of the pins had receeded back into the plug over time and were no longer making contact with the socket but may have been touching internally. A quick strip down of the plug, re insertion of the pins and a tightening of the cable clamp sorted the problem and all lights are now in working order.

After that we had a happy holiday.