[AT] Grounding

charlie hill charliehill at embarqmail.com
Thu Oct 23 12:23:52 PDT 2014


Alan, that is pretty much how boats are wired.
Everything is "home run" back to a buss bar that
is connected via a heavy cable back to the battery.

Good idea!

Charlie

-----Original Message----- 
From: Alan Nadeau
Sent: Thursday, October 23, 2014 12:28 PM
To: Antique tractor email discussion group
Subject: Re: [AT] Grounding

When I was running a four truck fleet of pickups on a snowplowing route I
adopted what had gradually evolved into a virtually trouble free wiring
system.  The ground side was ground bus and everything went through that.
Heavy cable from the battery to the bus and every electrical add-on was
connected there as well.  For the brakes the ground wire ran from the buss
to the trailer connector.  Every wire in the connector then ran to a
weathertight junction box under the trailer and from there to the load
points.  Light wiring was in conduit and a two conductor wire went to each
light, they were all rubber grometted lights.  Brakes got grounded back to
the junction box and the ground connection there went to the trailer frame
as well.

I had zero problems with grounds after doing that which made it well worth
the time it took to wire everything.

Something to keep in mind if you live, or tow in, the rust belt is that the
normal wiring setup has the brake controller being HOT all the time.  New
controllers feed a tiny voltage to the brake lead all the time to detect
when a trailer is connected.  The ground and the trailer brake feed are next
to each other at the bottom of the plug.  Get a little salt
water(electrolyte) in there when the roads are slush covered and the
controller will show something is hooked up when no trailer is there.  In
extreme cases that little bit of current combined with the salt water will
rot the contacts completely away.

My cure for that was two pronged, first step was to wire a 12V relay into
the power lead to the controller, triggering it off an ignition hot circuit.
Second step was to put a manual switch in that same power lead so the
trailer brakes could be shut off when there was no trailer involved.  That
manual switch was also very nice if I got caught on bad roads with an empty
trailer as I could shut the brakes off at will.  Sometimes it was safer to
run without brakes than to chance having the trailer turn into a sled.
----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Doug Tallman" <dtallman at accnorwalk.com>
To: "Antique tractor email discussion group" <at at lists.antique-tractor.com>
Sent: Thursday, October 23, 2014 11:28 AM
Subject: Re: [AT] Grounding


> Seems like Ford has some strange grounding issues. I've seen strange
> performance issues such as hiccups, surges and erratic shifts cured by
> adding ground straps. If you ground to the frame, make sure you clean
> all the other grounds and I'd probably add a ground from the battery
> ground wire at the block to the frame also. Doug T
>
>
>
>
> Joe Hazewinkel wrote:
>> Greg, mine does have the seven pin connector.  My truck is a diesel with
>> two batteries, do you think it matters which battery I hook the ground
>> to?
>>
>> I figured Ford would ground to the battery, but no such luck. I'm going
>> to have to look up a wiring diagram on-line and see if I can find
>> anything.
>>
>> Enjoy, Joe
>>
>> Sent via mobile device
>>
>> On Oct 23, 2014, at 9:54 AM, Easley, Greg <EasleyG at health.missouri.edu>
>> wrote:
>>
>> #10 stranded copper wire all the way back to the truck battery is a good
>> solution.
>> Replacing the 6-pin round connectors with the 7-pin RV type helps too.
>>
>>
>> -----Original Message-----
>> From: at-bounces at lists.antique-tractor.com
>> [mailto:at-bounces at lists.antique-tractor.com] On Behalf Of Henry Miller
>> Sent: Wednesday, October 22, 2014 9:46 PM
>> To: Antique tractor email discussion group; jahaze at aol.com
>> Subject: Re: [AT] Grounding
>>
>> It shouldn't harm anything, and might fix some other unexplained problem
>> as well.
>>
>> Trailers brakes take a lot of power, if you tested with just a voltmeter,
>> then I'd worry that the power line might not be able to supply full
>> voltage under load.
>>
>>
>>> On October 22, 2014 7:57:37 PM CDT, jahaze at aol.com wrote:
>>> To follow up on my trailer brake problem, I have been able to determine
>>> that I have plenty of voltage to the brake prong on the plug when I
>>> ground it to the truck, and a drop in voltage when I ground it to the
>>> ground prong.  My guess is that I have a weak ground connection on the
>>> truck.
>>>
>>> I tried to chase the ground wire through the truck wiring harness, but
>>> never did figure out where it was connected. What I'm thinking about
>>> doing is putting a jumper from the plug ground wire to the frame in the
>>> back of the truck to make a better connection.
>>>
>>> Is there any reason this won't work? Or does the ground wire have to be
>>> connected to another part of the truck?
>>>
>>> Enjoy, Joe
>>>
>>> Sent from my iPad
>>>
>>>
>>
>>
>
> _______________________________________________
> AT mailing list
> http://www.antique-tractor.com/mailman/listinfo/at
>

_______________________________________________
AT mailing list
http://www.antique-tractor.com/mailman/listinfo/at 




More information about the AT mailing list