Ranger Mods

I'm in the process of rewiring my trailer plug to suit a new caravan, coming next week (hopefully).

One of the things they ask for is12v power to Pin 8 to power the fridge. On the Ranger, Pin 9 has constant power on it already. What I'm wondering is, can I simply use the Pin 9 feed and swap it to Pin 8? The answer will depend on whether the amps rating is sufficient - the fridge element is 275w or about 25 amps.

I know running yet another (already have an Anderson plus an ALKO ESC cable) large cable would be better, but I'd rather not if I don't really have to.

So what is Pin 9 on the Ranger rated to is the question?

I've just had a look at the size of the wires going to the socket and they're too small. I won't be a slacker... I'll run a new cable and do it properly.

Still interested though in what sort of amps Ford says it will handle on pin 9?

Rang up the service manager at my dealer and asked him the question, the answer was I don't have a clue, that is one of the many things we are not told.

I then spoke to Frank of Frank's Auto Electrics.

He said the max he would draw off them as they are 6mm would be 30amps.

No way would he use them to charge a battery though.

I checked the wiring Ross and no way is it 6mm cable. I ran my own cable today just to be sure. I'll finish it off tomorrow, but at least I can be confident that the voltage drop will be minimal... nothing worse than warm beer after a long day behind the wheel. Lol

Oh, and am I surprised that Ford didn't know?

Ummmm, no, not really.

I probably went a bit overboard but I ran 100amp wire 6BS from the battery to the Anderson plug and also 100amp wire from the Anderson to the van battery, I don't get any voltage drop though.

You are correct, not 6mm but 5mm which is rated to 25amp.

Check in the loom for pin 8 near the plug as I have some other notes that state it is taped in the loom.

PIN 9 looks like a 20 Amp fuses and Pin 8 is 40 Amp. I notice it is 12 gauge so is still too light for the distance you want to run.

I've run new cables so all good thanks Stewart. Pin 9 is live and I've left that as is. However, I've snipped pin 8 and run new cable direct to the battery. I've also snipped pin 12 and put an ignition signal in there as it's apparently needed for the fridge to tell it the car's switched on.

I've also needed to run a 30a battery feed to a red andersen plug for the Alko ESC. Don't think I'd be able to fit one more wire under the red plastic battery terminal cover... it's chockas!

Hi All,
just picking up on this old thread as I am in the same boat as GerryP was above (sounds like he was wiring up for a NewAge or similar van as I am...?).

I have a new PX3 Wildtrak and have been looking into the 12 Pin trailer socket wiring.
On exploring mine it has a wire to every pin to the socket. The wires to pins 8 through 12 are all fairly light duty (~1.5mm2).
I went to Ford and asked for details on what was connected to those pins. First response:

• "they are all left blank with nothing connected"

I mentioned that there was wiring on mine as delivered new from the factory. Off he trots to the service supervisor - second response:

• "Those wires just go back into the loom and are not connected to anything. Later rangers have had the power connections removed from the trailer socket due to overheating problems and we do not recommend using these connections on the trailer socket for heavy loads. The wires may go back to a plug on the loom somewhere that is not plugged into anything.";

So far I haven't investigated this any further but will start to physically chase this if no one has any better info...?

My intention is to re-wire pins 8 & 10 with 10mm2 to suit powering the Fridge circuit in the Van (as required by NewAge). I will add an Ignition+ circuit to pin 12 to power the AES fridge sensing wire on the van. I will also be adding 2 x Anderson SB50's, one Grey with 6 B&S wiring for Van battery charging (via a battery isolator - SBI12) and the other Red with 6mm wiring to power that caravan Alko-ESC (stability control).

Has anyone got any clues on the mystery existing wiring on pins 8 through 12 of the Ford factory trailer socket?

Cheers, Ken

Yes, you're right, we have a New Age van. The wires terminate in the loom up behind the left rear wheel, including the blue wire for the brakes... no connector, just the end of the wire and you have to unwrap the tape to find them. I know one of the larger pins did have power not the ones we needed. I ran decent cables back to the plug and connected directly. It was a fairly big job including the two anderson plugs, but everything seems to work fine.

12 pin Trailer plug and socket, pins 1-7 are rated at 7A, pins 8-12 are rated to 20A. 8B&S twin cable is sufficient to run to Anderson plug for running 2 door fridge in van. Put relay operating from ignition in Ranger, then D+ wire in van can be connected to +ve terminal cable rear of fridge going to Anderson plug. No need to extend D+ to Ranger. 8B&S twin from a DC-DC is all you need to Anderson plug for battery charging in van. ESC can be connected to 8 &10 in plug and sockets as it only requires a 20 A fuse direct battery feed using 6mm twin cable.
Retired Auto Electrician.

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I use the live pin 9 to run a fridge overnight or power DC/DC charger in the trailer. I limit the DC/DC to 15amp charging so I don't blow the fuse again It's a pain to replace.

Hi all - have been following your comments with interest.

Here is what I have sus'd out regarding the wiring to the trailer socket on my ranger and ended up doing for my caravan wiring:
The wiring diagrams given on this post: viewtopic.php?f=22&t=2344 were very useful.

Turns out that on my Ranger PX3 Wildtrak MY19 3.2 pins 8 through 12 on the 12 pin trailer socket were actually wired as follows:

• Pin 8: 12v Charging, Orange wire, it is wired as shown on Image 4 (000198.png) of the post referred to above. The exception is that Ford have disconnected the 12V feed by removing Fuse 87 from the 12V distribution fuse box under the bonnet. Otherwise the connections are there. In the Trailer Tow Module (under the passenger seat) it goes through a relay which I assume is energised when a Trailer connection is detected. I had hoped to simply re-activate this by re-inserting Fuse 87, but Ford have removed one of the fuse pins in the fuse module so the White/Red VPWR wire to pin 1 of the trailer Tow Module is not live . Presumably "too many people were overloading this charging circuit and burning things out in the vehicles so Ford disabled it".

• Pin 9: 12V Aux called VPWR, Pink wire and is as shown on the same image as referenced above. It is a permanent 12v power from F64 in the 12V distribution fuse box via a 20A Fuse as shown. It is live on my ranger. The wiring is fairly light so I would avoid using it for any heavy power connections.

• Pin 10: GND Return - White wire. This wire is simply joined to the other GND white wire from Pin 3 in the loom of the wires from the trailer socket. These wires transition to Black/Green wires at the chassis plug socket under the rear left of the tub and are connected to a screw on the chassis near there.

• Pin 11: Fog Lights - Grey wire. Is wired back to the Trailer Tow Module as indicated on Image 2 (000200.png) of the post referred to above.

• Pin 12: Spare - Violet wire. Simply ends in the Loom as stated in the same drawing as for Pin 11.

My changes are:
I have mounted an aluminium plate in front of the battery under the bonnet of the Ranger. On this I have a contactor/relay (100A) being fed via a 100A fuse from the positive battery terminal. This feeds 2 thermal circuit breakers: 1) 50A supplying 12v to a Grey Anderson on the towbar for Caravan battery charging via 16mm2 twin cable; and 2) 35A to pin 8 of the trailer socket via a 10mm2 twin cable (black to trailer pin 10 GND to beef it up); 12V from the fuse is also fed directly to 2 more thermal circuit breakers being: 3) 30A to a Red Anderson on the towbar for caravan Electronic Stability Control (ESC) via 6mm twin; and 4) 25A power to the ford supplied trailer brake controller (Redarc) that I relocated from the positive terminal of the battery.
I had a Redarc SBI12 so used that as the contactor. At this stage it is running in its voltage sensitive mode, but I may have to change this as it will disconnect when the Smart Alternator drops the charge voltage. I will do this with an ignition switched relay if necessary.

The Redarc electric brake controller was wired to blue wire on pin 5 of the trailer socket by Ford. I did beef up the tail end of this connection to 6mm wire as ford has just spliced onto the light gauge wire that was originally connected to the trailer socket which didn't seem heavy enough to me.

I have disconnected and isolated the pink wire on Pin 9 of the trailer Socket as my caravan uses this to return the Brake-Safe Battery monitor signal to the vehicle. This isn't used in my case (as the vehicles are not registered in NSW) but felt it was best not to leave 12v on this pin!

My caravan requires an ignition switched 12v signal on pin 12 of the Trailer socket as the AES fridge sensing power control (turns the 3-Way Dometic AES fridge to 12v mode when a vehicle is connected and running). I hope to use the relay controlled 'Charging' circuit in the Trailer Tow module for this by re-routing the orange wire to pin 12 on my trailer socket where it is needed by my caravan... but that is still a work in progress.

Thanks for that info RadarKen, exactly what I needed. I looked into my own Ranger Wildtrak (18 build/19 registered) and things are slightly different. Fuse 87 (40A) is in place and provides power to pin 8 when the engine is on and the trailer plug is connected. Pin 9 is powered always through Fuse 64 (20A) as you identified.
My caravan doesnt have the fancy ESC stuff, and the fridge is a 12v only compressor type, so I'm going to use the pin 8 connection as an auxiliary battery charge for the van batteries.