Going Legit

 

As often happens in the wee hours of the morning, I lie awake in bed because a problem is rattling around my head. On one particular morning, after I wrote the blog post about taking a calculated risk of pulling a trailer without working lights, I had an idea. I had originally nixed the idea of adding the proper wiring for trailer lights because it required me to route a wire underneath my vehicle, something I can't do without having it up on a hoist or a lot of jacks, neither of which I have. So why can't I route it through the inside of the van? The only hard part I could foresee was the firewall, or metal partition between the engine and the passenger part meant to keep noise and fumes at bay. 

So I took another calculated risk that I could figure out some way of getting through that barrier and ordered the wire harness. Above is the wiring harness tucked into a side cubby where I also store a set of jumper cables. At this point, it was installed by removing a couple trim panels and unscrewing two bolts in each of the rear headlight assemblies to plug in the wiring harness and put everything back together. The only thing left was to route the power wire up to the vehicle battery in the engine compartment. The directions call for shoving it through a grommet in the floor and routing it underneath the vehicle. Instead, I tucked it under the trim between the carpet and the gray plastic pieces you see above, all the way to the front of the vehicle. Easy peasy. 

Above you see the firewall in the car above the brake and gas pedals and below the dash. The rod coming down is the steering column that controls the direction your car is going. Around it was a large rubber boot to seal up everything as the rod goes through the firewall and into the engine bay. I thought this would be my entrance for my power wire... and indeed it was in the end as you can see the red wiring coming out o fthe carpet and disappearing along the side of the rubber boot.

The first day I tried poking a wire through the rubber part and seeing if I could spot it in the engine compartment. The engine compartment is so compact, I couldn't spot it at all and the only thing I succeeded in doing was scraping up my wrist and forearm as I tried blindly groping for it. After another couple nights of good sleep, I finally had a restless one where my mind wandered onto this topic again. I thought, perhaps I could remove the cover to the engine air filter and see back to this area on the engine side of the firewall. The next day I did just that and bingo, I could see my wire poking through. I taped my red wire to the end and pulled the wire and the red wire into the engine compartment. The hard part was done... I hoped.

In short order, I was able to splice the terminal end onto the wire and connect it to a bolt on the positive battery post right before I dropped the nut into the bowels of the engine. I panicked and perhaps said a few choice words before getting a telescoping magnet and sticking it down into the bowels of where the nut had fallen. I pulled it up and behold, the nut was stuck to the magnet. I'm guessing I should buy a lottery ticket. I got the nut tightened so that the red wire now powers up my new trailer lights. I now legally can pull a trailer... and rent one from U-Haul, should I need to in the future. I am proud of myself and probably saved a lot of money by doing it myself though I would have gladly paid someone to do it for me if such a person existed in this part of the world.