Tourer Towbar Electrics Dedicated Wiring Harness -V- Direct Connection

[d-2610]

Hello, Can anyone help me with the argument about wiring towbar on the tourers ( mine is 2014) I have being told that I must use a dedicated and expensive Citroen wiring harness but I only occasionally pull a small trailer to the council tip. Has anyone else experienced any real problems with clipping direct into the rear lights etc? Thank you all.

[coastline taxis]

you can just join the wires to the cars wiring harness . the dedicated socket is just to make things easier

[paul.h]

I have always used a bypass relay on the towbar wiring to avoid any possible problems with the cars electrics. Then used scotch locks to connect it to the cars rear lighting wires. Many people do not like these and mess about soldering but I have had no problems with them and wrap some tape around the wiring to hold the loom together so they do not come undone. To provide an earth point I have simply drilled a hole, cleaned the paint off and used a nut and bolt to fasten the wiring to it. On our 2007 C5 I used the dedicated car's socket at the boot end but only for its 12 volt supply wire that comes from the dash fusebox, cutting it before the socket and taking it to the bypass relay. Since I was wiring for caravan towing this thick beige coloured wire was used for the supply for the 12S socket and I ran a second wire from the dash fusebox for the lighting 12N socket bypass relay. The fuse for the beige wire is not there unless one is put in, for your car have a look in the handbook to see which fuse it is - on our C5 it was from a permanent 12 volt supply, not ignition controlled. For lighting a 15 amp fuse shold be enough but for the caravan electrics 20 amp is normal.

 

Attached a photo of the C5 wiring before tidying it up.

 

There are some posts on here about towbars and wiring and an advanced search will find them.

 

To find which coloured/numbered wires are for each light you will need to trace them back from one of the rear lights.

[Teedee]

 I have being told that I must use a dedicated and expensive Citroen wiring harness

 

Rubbish!   Get yourself a TEB7AS relay off ebay - shop around and pay around £16.   It'll be a doddle to clip a Scotchlock on to each lighting connection in the boot.   I've been running C5's wired this way for lots of years.   The system is reliable and won't cause any electrical wobbles.