Anyone that has any good knowledge or experience with LED lights compatible electrical trailer adapters?
I did not know this?..

That my Mercedes needed a "special" adapter for a trailer, to get my trailers lights to actually light up..
I use to haul trailer all the time, never any problems but now with a new trailer, my cars electric suddenly "broke"..
Well, at least what I thought.. i searched for failed fuses, broken cables, all the forums, no power to my rear trailer connector, just some sporadic "ghost" power, just enough to make my trailer light glow. No turn signals or brake lights
Aha, ground problem of course! Of course it.. ehh.. never mind, ground is perfect, not that. So, what is it..? still searching the forums, crawling in and under my car, checking connectors on the SAM, what the heck?! Power in the car but nothing in the outlet! But when putting my tester in, NO PROBLEM!
Now I just want to put my Mercedes on fire and just walk away!!

But so sudden, someone said something about to use a "special" electrical adapter, one that make my car "feel" that the trailer actually is there!
There are several different types of connectors used to supply power from a tow vehicle's electrical system to a trailer's wiring system. Some trailers only need the bare essentials -- running lights, brake lights and turn signals -- while others require a connection for reverse lights, electric brakes and auxiliary power. With connectors ranging from simple to complex, it may be the case that the connection between your vehicle and your trailer is not a perfect match.
An adapter is an electrical device that allows a connection to be made between a mismatched trailer plug and vehicle socket. It easily plugs in your vehicle's electrical socket and usually requires no additional wiring.
Electrical adapter is designed to adapt a 7-way RV blade vehicle socket to fit a 4-way or 5-way flat plug on a trailer with LED lights.
It features built-in resistors for vehicles with computers that don't recognize LED lights and enables them to be compatible with trailers that have them.
Like Our Merc"s
Please let me know your thoughts about this, experiences, what brands works etc..
Thank You

 

Spamming old threads is not going to help you. Create a new thread only.

This thing is your answer to using LED trailer lights on a Mercedes (or any other vehicle with trailer detection):
I use this with our R500 and our boat trailer with LED lights. No issues whatsoever, including getting dunked whenever we launch/retrieve the boat. It even properly gave me a warning that the right LED brake light was out when it failed.

Every pin will work correctly with this adapter. The only thing the Mercedes needs to work properly is to properly detect the trailer brake/turn lights. If it does not, it will put everything on dim mode.

Alternatively, the rear SAM can be configured for LED trailer lights but it essentially disables light out detection for when you're towing a trailer with incandescent light bulbs. I prefer to use the above adapter.

 

Yup - I came across the same problem years ago and I have posted about this problem/solution a number of times. In short, I have the vehicle set for incadescent lights and now, whenever I tow a trailer with LED lights, I use an adaptor made by Curt. I think I paid about $15 for it, if memory serves. You should be able to find it on their website.

FYI... on my model year, I can have the car re-programmed for LED's. But then I have to go and have it programmed back... royal pain in the butt and absolutely ridiculous to have to do that. I thought I read, though, that in later years you were able to scroll through the menus in the dash and do it yourself?

 

That have been nice! To be able to choose thru the cars menus to choose what trailer lights I/you have! Thank you guys for your answers
It verifies of what I just recently discovered!
I wish I known this way earlier, and from what I read on the forums, a tons of owners thinks it’s something wrong with their cars. And it just needs an adapter?! 😳. When speaking to Mercedes about this issue, why does they not mention this adapter from the beginning before fail-searching and reprogram their SAMs?? 🤨
Again, thank you guys 🙏

 

Good question. Sometimes I think service guys (some, not all) have "blinders" on and anything outside of their narrow field of vision gets the response of "Oh, that's not how we do things around here".

You have a newer car than mine (see what I wrote above)... maybe you can change things in your dash?

 

yep, you have right! Many of these guys have a narrow and stupid behavior 😂
but of course, then we have some really good ones, the ones that think “outside the box” and using their minds! 👍
unfortunately they are the rare kind 😳
My GL is an -11 and I have not seen any possibility to do any changes in the menu about the trailer settings
thu I found out that I doesn’t have the heated steering wheel! 😥. I never used/needed it earlier years due to that I lived in Vegas, St George etc during winter months. But now I moving up to the N Nevada, and had looked forth to have a heated steering wheel (as I had in my Audi A8) but nope! Out w the gloves and just wave and smile 😊
Back to topic, I hoping that this thread can help other Mercedes owners with this “issue”..
Only needing one of these adapters, no need of cutting or modifications 😁

 

Yeah, I miss having a heated steering wheel, too.

I'm only going off memory here, but I "thought" it was 2010 and later models that you could do that adjustment. If it was me, I'd look through the manual (you can find them online) or just start going through all the menus in the dash before I bought anything, though.

 

Very few service people bother to figure out how systems work. I believe most of them are trained to just throw parts at the problem rather than determining the root cause. It also probably not in their service manual or TSBs that LED trailer lights need an adapter, just like it doesn't say anywhere that blinkers will hyperflash when replacing halogen with LED turn signals.

 

On my GL, the lights did not even hyper flash. The connector just gave a little “ghost” voltage so the trailer lights just very vaguely glow’d
Checking the trailer outlet with “just” test light, NOTHING! No voltage whatsoever, but putting the test connector in, when all was just fine 😳
so now I totally understand why, but for awhile I was totally lost. Almost on verge to burn the $&@%😡 thing down
now I can 😂about it 😉👍

 

Hyperflash was only in reference to replacing the car's turn signals. If the car cannot detect two trailer brake lights, it goes into the "ghost" mode as you put it. If it can detect at least one, it'll work properly but hyperflash on the side that isn't being detected.