Electric brakes

[Mike_Roo]

I recently bought a 2006 183 rockwood roo. I believe it has brakes but I think its manual? There is a metal wire with a looped end that hangs out in front. The private seller never mentioned it to me. Do i need this to work to tow it or am I fine just ignoring it? And where can I get info on how to use it?

 

[Mr. Dan]

Please post a picture of this “metal wire with a looped end”. Are you sure it’s a metal wire and not a paper wire? Could it be a cable? Maybe it’s the cable to the break-away emergency brake cable. We need a picture.

 

[Mike_Roo]

Added picture I don't think it's a metal wire. It's a cable.

 

[Boomerweps]

It is the trailer breakaway cable. It should be connected seperately to your tow vehicle. It’s so that if the hitch fails, it pulls from that plastic box, putting the trailer’s battery full current to the trailer brakes.
If your trailer has that, it should have a seven pin plug that normally supplies 12vdc from your tow vehicle when the brakes are applied. This is usually proportional to how much braking you apply and is user adjustable. The breakaway applies full trailer battery power and will until reset or trailer battery is drained.

 

[Chuck_S]

The break-away lanyard should be attached separately from the chains, etc. and should be the very last item to break away when the trailer gets detached. Should not activate if the chains are still attached otherwise the whole rig may get uncontrollable. The purpose is NOT to save the trailer it's to minimize damage to everything else on the road by stopping the runaway trailer.

Failure sequence: Hitch -> Chains -> Breakaway

-- Chuck

 

[pgandw]

As others have mentioned, the break-away cable is an emergency application of your trailer brakes. It's not a manual brake.

For normal trailer braking, a brake controller in the tow vehicle sets the amount of braking in your trailer's brakes. Some more recent tow vehicles come already equipped with a brake controller as part of their trailer towing package. Until recently, most did not so you had to add a brake controller to your vehicle. Power gets to the trailer brakes, lights, and battery charging through the 7-pin connection between the tow vehicle and trailer.

Generally, you adjust the brake controller to get the right amount of braking force from the trailer. I like to adjust mine so that I can barely feel the trailer brakes - it's braking at the same rate (actually just a little more) as the tow vehicle.

Fred W

 

[Aussieguy]

and don't use the electric brakes as a parking brake by pulling the pin out of the e-brake box

you battery will get flat in no time...

use chocks or other methods to stop trailer from rolling down a hill

 

[Oaklevel]

I recently bought a 2006 183 rockwood roo. I believe it has brakes but I think its manual? There is a metal wire with a looped end that hangs out in front. The private seller never mentioned it to me. Do i need this to work to tow it or am I fine just ignoring it? And where can I get info on how to use it?

You brakes are not manual. As others have said that is a brake away set up. Your trailer brakes which you have need a controller on the tow vehicle, and 12V powered by the tow vehicle through your 7 pin plug.

 

[MGD1961]

This will answer a lot of questions for you

 

[bikendan]

Moved thread from the Towing and Tow Vehicles sub-forum to the Hybrid section's Roo/Shamrock sub-forum.

 

[Chuck_S]

Late mode pickups and SUVs with trailer towing opeions commonly have all the wiring factory installed for a brake controller. Some like my 2017 Expedition have a very competent brake controller already installed. Plug-n-Play. On my 2007 Expedition there was a plug-in connection under the dash where all I had to do was attach my Tekonsha Prodigy brake controller -- darn near Plug-n-Play.

If you have a round 7-pole "Bargman" connector on the back bumper you're at least 50% there, maybe 100%.

-- Chuck

 

[bikendan]

I recently bought a 2006 183 rockwood roo. I believe it has brakes but I think its manual? There is a metal wire with a looped end that hangs out in front. The private seller never mentioned it to me. Do i need this to work to tow it or am I fine just ignoring it? And where can I get info on how to use it?

I don't know of any travel trailer, in the last 25 years, that had manual brakes.
They all have been electric.

 

[Reverse_snowbird]

As others have said, that's a breakaway cable.
When you attach it to your truck, make certain that it has enough 'play' that it's not going to pull out the trailer end as you make a turn. We found that out the hard way when we made a very slow right hand turn as we were learning how to tow the tt. We attached the cable to the truck incorrectly so that there wasn't a lot of play in the cable.
The breakaway cable was very effective and when it pulled out the trailer end, it stopped the trailer and the truck abruptly.