Trailer Brakes and Tailgate

[snow]

I bought a new 2007 Chevy HD 2500 extended cab, short box, truck worked fine till I wanted to tow my 3075 Montana. Anyway, truck has the intergratted brake controller on the truck. The output phase would read nothing, but I had brake lights n thought I still had trailer brake working.
After 2 days at the dealer, they found the problem, at the back where you plug in the trailer, there is an inside module u don,t see, and one of those pins were bent, not letting the circuit to continue to trailer brakes.
A 5 minute fix, after 2 days of trying to find out the problem.Anyway, the Chevy handled the trailer with no-brakes, 160 mile round trip...luckily, no high-speed stops. Glad they fixed it, next trip will be much farther.Will see how brakes work then...fingers crossed......(afterwards, I learned, you can squeeze the manual brake and hear the magnets hum on trailer...good reference for next time.)
The tailgate problem on the truck was when they put in the sprayed in bedliner, it made it too thick where the tailgate closes, putting pressure on the handle to open. Has easy lift tailgate option, closed great, wife couldn,t open it..too hard. Chevy dealer said is was too muck spray liner and didn,t do anything. I took it back to where I had it sprayed on, they re-adjusted the tailgate, and it works great now. There is just a small amount of adjustment, but it worked. So, if you get this problem, look there.

George & Joan Berlinger
Lapeer Michigan
2007 Chevy HD EXT CAB SB
Duramax Diesel
6 Speed Allision
3075 Montana 2007
16K Slider Hitch
TrailAir Pin Box

[snfexpress]

My 2007 GMC 3500 had the same wiring problem - our dealer spent 2 hours chasing it down! It, too, was a bent pin in the harness plug at the rear of the truck.

[happy campers]

Some of you might disagree with me on this, but..........after hooking up, doing my pretrip inspection (which also includes a visual check to see that the jaws are around the pin), and we're in the truck, ready to go, I put the truck in gear and apply the trailer brake. That verifies that I'm hooked, and that the brakes are working. This is on our 5th wheel, but the brake check should work for a TT as well.

[skypilot]

I do the same as Frank; Hook up and get the weight off the landing gear and then do a pull test; 2 purposes, to make sure that I'm hitched (eyeball it first but always that chance); by having the gear down but weight off, if I do pull from the hitch, the trailer doesn't hit the TV (I have signature series hitch for which there is no bedsaver available . Second reason is to test the brakes, confirms that they are working even though I've already checked all the lights, etc.. Maybe a little over cautious but I've never been late to my destination because I took the few extra minutes at the start.

[stiles watson]

Good safety reminders from all who posted. Happy RVing....

[simonsrf]

The pull test is a must for us.

Saw a poor unfortunate person drop Monty on his truck at the Shasta rally. He thought it was latched, but didn't take the time to make sure. There is nothing you can do but give the driver sympathy.

We have seen so many people drive out without checking the hook-up or the lights...was wondering what they were thinking, and then decided that they were not thinking....and then Darwin came to mind.

Be safe out there!