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Trailer Socket
Assignment
Up to now, the 13-pin outlet socket has not been able to completely replace the old 7-pin socket. Particularly as far as the comprehensive offering of rental trailersis concerned, where the sockets must be as universal
as possible, will keep this trend going for still quite a while. Adapters for one or the other direction are also available ...
Function
When adding an automatic trailer-coupling, a coplete electrical system can be installed. One then has no bother with terminal descriptions. It is of course, much cheaper to wire the outlet oneself.

Here are the terminal descriptions seen from the plug-side:
Description | Function | 7-pin | 13-pin L |
L | Left indicator | at the top | 1 |
54 | Brake light | above left | 6 |
54g | See text! | above right | 2 |
58L | Left parking light | Center | 7 |
58R | Right parking light | bottom left | 5 |
31 | Earth 1 - 8 | bottom right | 3 |
R | Right indicator | bottom | 4 |
30 | Permanent plus | | 9 |
15 | Plus (ignition) | | 10 |
31 | Earth for 10 | | 11 |
| Reversing lights | | 8 |
| Trailer-recocnition | | 12 |
| Earth for 9 | | 13 |
The wiring is fairly simple, if the lighting system is not yet controlled through the CAN-Bus, and there are no special control functions for the rear lights. One can
then tap each of the two
rear lights with an edge-connector. Indeed, a control-lamp for the trailer indicators is still necessary. Either an indicator relay with trailer-control (see indicator
system) is already
installed, or the existing one can simply be replaced. One can also use one, specially developed for trailer outlets, with an acoustic warning device. The terminal 54g is interesting because it was originally intended for
the electric brake control in trucks. Nowadays, it is used for various functions, e.g., for the electricity supply for caravans, the rear fog-light- or the reversing lamp/s.
Taking a closer look, one discovers a small opener on the outlet, which is activated by the plug. This is a trailer-recognition, which switches off the vehicle fog-light during trailer operation, to avoid blinding the
following traffic.
Repair
Those who uncouple the trailer first, and only afterwards pull out the plug, run the risk of forgetting the latter. Should one then drive off, the cable is mostly torn from the plug. In this case, the trailer cannot even be driven
to the next workshop, because neither the brake lights nor the indicators function. The question which arises, is whether one can rewire this oneself. The following paragraphs contain a small tutorial for 7-pin plugs.
Thereby, it is important, never to connect the earth-wire to the other connections, otherwise, the next time the respective
function is switched on it will mean replacing a fuse. 10/06
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