No one has thrown stones at these poor efforts of mine (you had your chance!) and I've actually gotten words of praise from people. Encouraged thus, I'll try another one.
Are you completely satisfied with the performance (brightness, reliabilility) of the exterior lights on your SS? I wasn't. I had visions of being blasted in the rear by someone who would then step out of the resulting pile of rubble and ask pointed questions about my ancestry, brake lights, turn signals and things like that. Probably I would have had a sneaking hunch that his point might have validity. At least, the part about the lights.
I resolved to "do something" about it. You could hardly see them on a bright day. And in the dark, the license plate light was a joke. I had visions of some bored B&W wanting to chat about that sometime.
First, of course, is the cheap/easy/quick stuff.
Clean lenses--replace as necessary. Clean electrical contacts, sockets. . . the usual stuff.
While I was into the brake/turn fixtures (round ones on my '70) I noted that the interior of the fixture was painted. Black.
I've not, in my 61 years plus, ever been made aware that black was a particularly reflective color. I, therefore, got out some aluminum foil and a tube of GE rubber sealer/glue/patching material. (Any hardware store and EVERYONE should carry a tube at all times in a SS. It's like duct tape in that regard, and just about as useful.) Make the fixtures bright and shiny inside.
The visibility of the brake/turn lights, and backup lights if you do them, will be improved.
But, not enough to suit me. Now, the hard part.
As was the case with the pump, by the time current actually gets to the point it's needed (thru a proliferation of switches, plugs, yards and yards of wire, etc.) that immutable fact of life known as Ohm's Law has wrought significant damage to the voltage. E=IR, y'know.
The fix:
Amazingly similar to the fix for the pump. I ran a beefy (10 ga) chunk of wire directly from the positive and negative poles of the battery in El Fordo (my tow vehicle) to the Bargeman connector at the rear end. Everything protected by a self-resetting circuit breaker, naturally.
This circuit, along with the usual brake lights, backup lights, running lights--all the usual stuff >>>>>>EXCEPT BRAKES<<<<<< then runs to a suitable weather and rock/dust/mud/waterproof steel box mounted on the forward frame of the SS just below the propane bottles.
Within this box find (wait for it) RELAYS! Purchased at (wait for it again)Radio Shack.
The original circuits now do nothing more than key relays. The relays control the light circuits as desired/required. The current path for these lights is now much more direct and is made up of a much bigger conductor--at least to the "input connector" on the SS. Nothing inside the trailer is modified in any way.
I use plug-in relays and carry spares (2.) I also did a similar thing with the charging circuit--with gratifying results.
I also have a convenient place on the front of the trailer to plug in anything (I installed a suitable connector on the charge line) using modest amounts of 12VDC--such as a trouble light, or my laptop computer when I wish to sit outside and use it.
It also took no great stretch of imagination to install switches that allow me to turn on light circuits and do a "bulb check" without getting ElFordo into the act. (And, sometimes when I'm plugged into ground power somewhere, I turn on the running lights. It looks "kewel," as the teens put it.)
Now, if I get blasted in the rear, I will be the one stepping out of the rubble and calling into question ancestry, eyesight, etc., 'cause the lights all work just swell, thank you!
Oh . . . the license plate light. The plastic "lens" in mine had become quite opaque. I glued in a small scrap of shatter resistant plastic glazing I scrounged at my local hardware store. It's still a joke--but it's a much brighter joke.
If anyone needs more particulars on this, please e-mail me direct.
Yours brightly,
Clark
WA7GGV
27' '70