Haymann Reese towbar and Britpart electrics.

[bnicho]

I fitted my Haymann Reese towbar and electrics over the cup day weekend. I thought I'd share a little of what I experienced.

The towbar cost $591 delivered. This is the best deal I could find. I was quoted delivery in two or three days. It took three weeks, which made me rather annoyed.

Oddly the plate on towbar shows a 250kg max ball weight. It should be 150kg but I won't argue.



The towbar came with a loom that plugged into the tail lights wiring and a plug for a lights computer (not included). I was annoyed to find I had been changed $19 for this (included in the $591 total) when I didn't want it!

I had already sourced a Britpart 12N/12S twin socket electrics kit from the UK for about $250. The Brtipart unit plugs into the big grey plug just like the genuine LR part.

This is the plug on the Britpart kit that slots into the socket in the boot:


Most of the wires for the 12N socket in the Britpart kit already matched Aus colour code standards. The exceptions being there were two tail light circuits and a fog light circuit. Neither of these are relevant in Aus.

I did some small mods to make the loom suitable for what I wanted:

I unpicked the loom to the "Y" part and pulled out the black redundant extra tail light wire and pushed in the 12v permanent wire from the white socket's loom in it's place. This is so I can run 12v permanent to my trailer and caravan. All my cars are set up this way via the Aux circuit in the 7 pin plug.

I then capped off each of the redundant wires with heartshrink and taped them up on the loom so they were neatly out of the way.

I cut the blue wire at the computer end. This is the fog light wire. That leaves the blue wire easily accessible inside the car in the future to run electric trailer brakes. (Blue wire is trailer brakes in Australian standards).

The end of the wires at the trailer plug end. This is after I swapped the black wire for the +12v one. The shorter wire is the 12v+:


Redundant wiring in the Loom taped back:


The black UK 7pin 12S plug supplied in the Brtipart kit is the same as an Aussie UK plug and seems to be higher quality that the usual Narva etc we find here. Especially nice was the rubber boot to go over he back and protect from water and dirt ingress.

It took most of a day to fit the towbar and mod and fit the loom. However, some of that was drink breaks, lunch and a trip to the hardware store to buy an 18mm socket.

Everything bolted in neatly. The only hard part was cutting the slot out of the rear bumper. The HR instructions on where to cut were good, but my cuts were not so tidy. I ended up hiding the rough edges with a little pinchweld.

I was pleased to find that when I plugged in my LED-only trailer the indicators flashed at normal speed and the little green trailer light flashed properly on the dash. There are no special resistors in that trailer. I know because I built it myself several years ago. So it sees the Britpart unit is smart enough to work with LED's out of the box.

I expected the reverse sensors would not automatically cut out when the trailer was plugged in and I was right. I need to get onto a Navicom or similar to correct that. For the moment I put up with the screeches when reversing the trailer. I don't have a switch on the dash to kill the sensors and turning down the radio volume does not work! (2007 UK spec GS.)

Cheers,
Brett.

[Walruslike]

I fitted my Haymann Reese towbar and electrics over the cup day weekend. I thought I'd share a little of what I experienced.



The towbar cost $591 delivered. This is the best deal I could find. I was quoted delivery in two or three days. It took three weeks, which made me rather annoyed.



Oddly the plate on towbar shows a 250kg max ball weight. It should be 150kg but I won't argue.







The towbar came with a loom that plugged into the tail lights wiring and a plug for a lights computer (not included). I was annoyed to find I had been changed $19 for this (included in the $591 total) when I didn't want it!



I had already sourced a Britpart 12N/12S twin socket electrics kit from the UK for about $250. The Brtipart unit plugs into the big grey plug just like the genuine LR part.



This is the plug on the Britpart kit that slots into the socket in the boot:





Most of the wires for the 12N socket in the Britpart kit already matched Aus colour code standards. The exceptions being there were two tail light circuits and a fog light circuit. Neither of these are relevant in Aus.



I did some small mods to make the loom suitable for what I wanted:



I unpicked the loom to the "Y" part and pulled out the black redundant extra tail light wire and pushed in the 12v permanent wire from the white socket's loom in it's place. This is so I can run 12v permanent to my trailer and caravan. All my cars are set up this way via the Aux circuit in the 7 pin plug.



I then capped off each of the redundant wires with heartshrink and taped them up on the loom so they were neatly out of the way.



I cut the blue wire at the computer end. This is the fog light wire. That leaves the blue wire easily accessible inside the car in the future to run electric trailer brakes. (Blue wire is trailer brakes in Australian standards).



The end of the wires at the trailer plug end. This is after I swapped the black wire for the +12v one. The shorter wire is the 12v+:





Redundant wiring in the Loom taped back:





The black UK 7pin 12S plug supplied in the Brtipart kit is the same as an Aussie UK plug and seems to be higher quality that the usual Narva etc we find here. Especially nice was the rubber boot to go over he back and protect from water and dirt ingress.



It took most of a day to fit the towbar and mod and fit the loom. However, some of that was drink breaks, lunch and a trip to the hardware store to buy an 18mm socket.



Everything bolted in neatly. The only hard part was cutting the slot out of the rear bumper. The HR instructions on where to cut were good, but my cuts were not so tidy. I ended up hiding the rough edges with a little pinchweld.



I was pleased to find that when I plugged in my LED-only trailer the indicators flashed at normal speed and the little green trailer light flashed properly on the dash. There are no special resistors in that trailer. I know because I built it myself several years ago. So it sees the Britpart unit is smart enough to work with LED's out of the box.



I expected the reverse sensors would not automatically cut out when the trailer was plugged in and I was right. I need to get onto a Navicom or similar to correct that. For the moment I put up with the screeches when reversing the trailer. I don't have a switch on the dash to kill the sensors and turning down the radio volume does not work! (2007 UK spec GS.)



Cheers,

Brett.

I've recently done a towbar install and my thread is how not to do it... yours is how to...

Bummer about turning audio down not working... I felt foolish when I first discovered that mine could be silenced with the volume switch. An obvious thing but I hadn't tried it...

I had the Genuine LR loom and I definitely needed to install a resistor across the indicator circuit. Glad yours is working out well. Mine too now the pain is slowly fading in time....