2005-06-27 - 10:47 p.m.
Silly Rabbit...
So we drove back from Kansas on Thursday afternoon, at least we started to drive back.
It took a couple of days, we used to do it in one long haul, but with age comes wisdom (or at least a sore back) and we stopped the first night and slept in the back of the Tahoe. It wasn�t too bad, if we had planned ahead we could have brought a cushion but we managed.
The next evening we stopped in the Kentucky mountains to get some dinner and realized that the lights on the trailer weren�t working. This was an ongoing problem, as we couldn�t get the left brake light to come on even though we replaced the light before we left.
Now for those of you that aren�t of the God fearing type, feel free to roll your eyes at the next part (I would if I wasn�t of the god fearing type myself)
The lights not working was in fact a friendly helping hand from the man upstairs. If the lights hadn�t stopped working, I wouldn�t have pulled the wiring harness apart, and if I hadn�t pulled the wiring harness apart I wouldn�t have seen that the idgit� that installed the harness decided that the trailer brakes were an �option� the brake actuator wire was clipped off at the base and not even stripped. The rest of the wires were just stuffed into the sockets and the setscrews were not seated.
Kansas is pretty flat, and Jill�s mom is a �conservative� driver. I also don�t think that they actually pulled that trailer very often. All this means that I doubt they noticed that the brakes on the trailer weren�t working. I hadn�t noticed, and I drove the thing across several states. (The trailer was empty though)
Jill�s mom (being especially cautious) had new tires put on the trailer and had it �checked out� before we left for our trip. Way to go guys, thanks for �checking the trailer out� A Ron White routine comes to mind.
We were at a Hardees in the same parking lot as a Wal-Mart so we pulled the trailer under the parking lot lights and I went in and got a new harness and plug. (I had already pulled the old one apart and rewired it to no avail)
Installed the new harness and plug, and presto! Lights and brakes! (big difference by the way)
The place we stopped was the last town before we started heading down the mountains. The trailer weighs 2000+ empty, I think that an emergency stop on the down hill side of the mountain would have been pretty hairy without the trailer brakes.
So there you have it, if you see God there, great, even if you don�t you have to admit that we were exceptionally fortunate.
The rest of the trip was long but uneventful; we got home Saturday just in time to stop by Midsummer�s Twilight Tourney.
More to come in the next issue.
Justus
