Dollycide: Losing RV Signals Due to Improper Dolly Design

[andyshane]

I was pulling out my hair, suffering sporatic blown flasher fuses, on a recent trip. Then, the flasher unit itself failed. It was a maiden voyage with our new-to-us Patriot Thunder, our guests rolled their eyes every time I slid open the window to signal with my arm, got honked at, pulled into a truck stop to change yet another set of fuses.

Finally, I unplugged the dolly lights and didn't blow another fuse.

Today, after three hours of diagnostics and disassembling the dolly electrical system, I finally spotted the culprit: two tiny bites on a pair of wires going through a brand-new finder to the light assembly bolted to the outside.

Yes, after catastrophic blowouts on BOTH sides of the dolly due to inferior OEM tires, I had to install new fenders. They arrive prewired, are simply mounted and plugged in. Turns out, at the factory the person who installed the lights put so much pressure on the wiring where it passes through the 1/4" hole that the insulation was severed inside of 2,000 miles of use. Of course, none of the pass-throughs are engineered with a 20 cent rubber grommet to protect the wiring; so, this kind of failure was bound to be repeated, had I not wrapped the wires in thick rubber tape.

It seems dollies are designed to sell, rather than to last.

[dickandlois]

Hi Andy, Just got back North from the Lone Star State about 2 hrs. ago. The temperatures are still a little on the cool side this close to Canada.

This link might lead you to what you need if your so inclined.

Other then the wiring issue I hope the rest of the trip went well on the shake down run.

http://electronics.mcmelectronics.com/search?p=Q&ts=custom&w=rubber%20grommets&pw=rubber%20grumets&rt=spelling&isort=score&view=list

Rich.

[Koliver]

Tell us more about your blowouts. I am interested because this year, on our trip south for the winter, I suffered total overheating of one of my dolly tires, which led to replacement of both. I blamed loss of balance, which led to bouncing, which led to severe cupping, which led to severe overheating, which would have led to a blowout if I hadn't stopped to take a leak, and while stopped, did a walk around with a heat gun, found the hot tire, turned around and headed for a tire dealer.

Mine were replaced when I bought the dolly used, 10000 mies and two years before. I saw little wear and no cupping when leaving home a thousand miles before losing the tire, so the only thing I could think of that would explain the damage was loss of balancing weights. The other tire had also started cupping, so I replaced both. I now have 2000 miles on the next pair and they still look like new, still have their balancing weights.

So tell us your story.