My wife and I bought a 95 18' Tow lite the other night, and couldn't be more pleased. Having never had a trailer with electric brakes, I was wondering if I need to get a controler (if so, suggestions) on my 2005 Toyota Tundra.

Yes, you will need a brake controller.

I installed a Prodigy Electronic Brake Control on my 2006 Toyota Tacoma. It came with a tow package so it was a plug-n-play. When I had may 2001 Toyota Tacoma I had to wire it in by building my own wiring harness. On the 2006 Toyota the charge curcuit from truck to the trailer was not large enough to charge the battery and run the refrigerator on 12 volts.

I did not want to mount the brake controller to my plastic dash, so I fabircated a heavy gauge sheetmetal bracket (mounted it to a metal support under the dash) to hold the controller.

Back to the charging system, You need to run a 30 amp charging curcuit with a 10 gauge wire. With towing your hi-lo, running the the refrigerator on 12 volts you need at least 13 amps. My Toyota had a 18 gauge wire and had an output of 5 amps. I ran down my house battery just trying to get to the campground.

I wrote what I did in this forum under: battery charging while towing

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Les & Patricia
2006 22ft towlite (replaces 97 21TL)
2006 Toyota tacoma pre-runner 4.0 L V-6 quad cab
w/ 98 chevy Powervision towing mirrors
2017 Chevy Silverado 1500 5.3 v8 (replaces Toyota)
2 Hobie mirage pedal drive kayaks

18 gauge wire? OMG!

- Jack

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Hi-Lo 1707T - Tire Minder TPMS on Tow Vehicle and Trailer, 300W Solar Battery Charger, Equal-i-zer WDH, Progressive Dynamics Converter, Fan-Tastic Fan, LiFePO4 battery 12V DC Electrical System
2014 F150 Platinum 4x4 3.5L EcoBoost SCrew

Les,

From I have researched (checking with the dealer and my VIN #) I have the towing package in my 2005 Tundra. Where do I plug the controller into? I asked the service Mgr at Toyota, but since it was not a factory item he was reluctant to show me where to connect to. Any help is appreciated.

Thanks,

GySgt M.Clark U.S.M.C (ret)

The manual for my 2007 Tacoma shows the location for the connector in the Trailer Towing section. It also states that there is a plug in harness that can be found in the glove box. I don't remember having that, I believe that I got the Toyota connection adapter that goes with the controller. It was just a matter of plugging into the connector and the controller, and mounting the controller.

Thanks ya'll for all the information