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Cab space is always at a premium, and bulky boxes can get in the way. This controller is only 1" thick and mounts flush against the dash using the included bracket and hardware. Because it’s a time-delayed design, you can position it at any angle without affecting performance. The result is a clean look and an easy reach to the controls without interfering with your knees or dash layout.
Different trailers and loads need different brake force. The Discovery NEXT lets you fine-tune both power and aggressiveness with two rocker switches. Gain adjusts from 0.5 to 9.9, setting how much overall power reaches the trailer brakes. Load adjusts from 1 to 9 to control how quickly that power comes on. Together they let you dial in smooth, predictable stops whether your trailer is light or at full load.
The bright, adjustable LED display shows clear numbers and letters so you can see your gain level or error messages at a glance. A built-in auto-sleep mode activates after 5 minutes to prevent battery drain. When you need to slow the trailer instantly, the large pinch-trigger manual override is right there—easy to grab without taking your eyes off the road.
The included harness plugs directly into your vehicle’s factory brake-control port under the dash, so wiring is simple and reversible. Just connect, mount, and you’re ready to tow. The setup works with up to 4 axles (8 brake assemblies) and supports electric or electric-over-hydraulic brakes, plus low-volt, PWM, ABS, and cruise control systems—all without cutting a single wire.
Alternate Instructions
Videos are provided as a guide only. Refer to manufacturer installation instructions and specs for complete information.
Hi, everyone, Aidan here with etrailer. Today, we're gonna be taking a look at the Curt Discovery NEXT Brake Controller. This is gonna be a time-delayed brake controller. Let's check it out. When it comes to brake controllers, there's gonna be two options you're probably looking at, time-delayed and proportional. Proportional is gonna be the nicer of the two where if you lightly press your brakes, the brakes in your trailer are also going to be lightly applied.
If you slam on the brakes, the brakes in your trailer are also going to match that proportionally. With a time-delayed brake controller, it's gonna be applied at the same rate every time, so you don't get that fine adjustment. You can still adjust the settings, but it's gonna be the same every time. So if we're rolling up to a stop sign, coming to a very slow and predictable stop, and our gain and sensitivity are set kinda high, it's gonna be applying the brakes pretty hard. Same for if we have those set kind of low and we slam on our brakes on the highway, because someone in front of us stopped, the brakes aren't gonna be applied in a similar fashion.
There is the manual override you can always pinch to apply, but that's just something to know with a time-delayed system like this. Let's talk about those controls. The manual override is a pinch style where I'm pressing the button with my thumb. It's pretty easy to reach from the driver's seat where I've got it all set up. So whenever I'm driving, I feel like if I needed to suddenly reach down and get it, I can find that pretty easily every time, and index my thumb well enough to get a good press.
So good to know for emergency situations where you might need that. Now, there's gonna be two sets of controls here for the gain and the load. The orange buttons are going to adjust our gain or our brake power. You can go anywhere from 0.5 up to 9.9, and this is going to signify the different power levels. So 0.5 is the weakest, and as I go up, it's going to get more and more powerful.
So if I have a heavier trailer that needs more stopping power, I'd set it higher. The next one is going to be our load. This is basically how quickly the brakes are applied, so that can go from 1 to 9. At 1, it's going to be the lowest, and at 9, it's going to be the fastest or the quickest application. So basically, ramping from zero to fully applied where we have that gain set. So for demonstration, I'm just going to put the gain all the way up to max, and I'm gonna hit the brakes. And you'll see, slowly, it'll climb up to where we set it. And if I turn that load down all the way to 1, it's going to climb much slower to that designated power level. So you can fine tune this to your own trailer application, and depending on how heavy of a trailer you have and how good the brakes are, that will determine what you want those set at. But generally, that gain is going to be for the weight of the the trailer, and you can kinda determine the load from there. Now, to give a visual indicator of that gain, we've got our vehicle hooked up to a trailer simulator box. I've got the gain set to the absolute lowest it goes, so that's gonna be the lowest brake power, and you can see where the voltage is reading right now. If I turn the gain up to 5, that's gonna be right in the middle, you'll see that voltage will climb up higher. And then if I turn it up to the max, 9.9, you'll see that climb up even higher. So this is just to give you some visual indication of that different power level of the braking. This is designed to work with trailers up to four axles and will work with PWM, ABS, cruise controller, and electric-over-hydraulic brakes. So keep that in mind as you're picking this out if it's gonna work with your trailer. Up to four axles, I'd say for the most part, you're gonna be totally fine. If you don't need one that can go up to four axles and you like this style, Curt does make a similar version that's up to three axles. So that's something to keep in mind too if you don't need this much. Now, the big advantage to something like this, and something you probably noticed if you're familiar with brake controllers already, is going to be the size. It's a lot smaller and a lot more shallow than the brake controller we pulled out of this 4Runner today. And that's great, because even though it's mounted externally, it's not going to be in the way of your knees as you're getting in and out of the vehicle. And as I'm in a normal driving position, I've got plenty of distance between it and my leg. I don't feel like I'm gonna be hitting it all the time, 'cause it doesn't stick out very far. That's thanks to the very low profile bracket. We've got it mounted up with the included double-sided adhesive, but you can also use the included self-tapping screws. Just know that they're pretty long, and you're gonna have to have clearance behind there. But this will just click into place over that bracket. (bracket clicking) You can hear that snap in, and that's what holds it in. One thing to note is that because it's not inertia based, you can mount this really wherever it fits best, so it doesn't necessarily need to be level or facing any certain direction. Now, the installation can vary depending on your vehicle. I'd say check for what your vehicle has in terms of pigtail adapters. That's what we we're able to do with this option from Curt. We offer this pigtail adapter on our site here at etrailer, and that allows us to just plug directly into the vehicle's prep package for this. So just check to see if your vehicle can do that, because that's definitely going to be the easiest option as far as installation goes, 'cause it just plugs right in and all you have to worry about is mounting up that bracket, and then tucking up that wire loom from the adapter. Something else to note is that that LED readout does have a number of different functions. You can adjust the brightness, there's a day and night mode, but it's also gonna give us readouts for different errors. So if something's maybe not fully connected or something, it will tell us here. Your instructions give you a full list of all the different errors that can occur and short descriptions of what they are. But because its screen gives full text readouts, it's pretty easy to tell what's going on based on what it's showing. Like for example, when we first hooked this up to our simulator box, we didn't have the 7-way plugged in all the way, and it told us it wasn't connected. So we went back there, pushed the plug in the rest of the way, and then it worked properly. So that's going to help with just troubleshooting anything that may be occurring in your setup. For me, I think this is a nice middle ground between having the controls, easy to access, and having that LED readout, so you can see those errors and the power, and just have a little bit more control over it while still staying out of the way and being flushed to the dash. But that was just our look at the Curt Discovery NEXT Brake Controller. Thanks for watching.
Customer Satisfaction Score:
99% were satisfied with this product
1% of customers were not satisfied
Ratings & Reviews
Fast shipping and works perfectly
I could not find this quick connector anywhere in town so I did an internet search and etrailer had the best price. This connector worked perfectly and was very easy to install.
Great instructions easy to find factory plug-in and plug this adapter for my brake controller.
Controller got here quickly, Not hard to install on my RAM once I found the factory plug for after market brake controller.
Pulled my travel trailer this past weekend and the Curt control worked well.
Seems to consistently work. No issues.
Glad the website recommended this. It was very easy to install, just plug it in to the existing wire connector under the dash by the accelerator pedal and the other end in the controller.
Just what I needed
Works perfect on my 2026 RAM 1500 pick up. One big advantage of ordering from etrailer is the information they have on their website that shows where the location of components and how to complete the installation. Highly recommended:
Just got my trailer brake installed, took less than 30 minutes. The wiring harness that was made for my truck pugged in with no problem. I have already tried it and it works great. Shipping notifications were updated every day so I knew exactly when to expect it. Their pricing was competitive with eBay and Amazon. I cannot say enough good things about this company and their service, I highly recommend them.
Very happy with controler and bracket. Easy to install took me only minutes.
Have a 2015 Dodge Ram 1500. After searching countless hours to find a "plug-n-play" trailer brake, I found etrailer. They sent me my trailer brake AND a pre-wired harness/adaptor that plugged right in to my existing harness under the dash. Awesome customer service!
I needed this adapter to connect the brake controller to my specific vehicle. Etrailer had it available when I bought the controller from them , so I ordered it. Easy connection, works great.
I recently purchased a 2018 Dodge Ram 1500 and traded in my 2014 Dodge Ram. I had removed my Curt brake controller and was to install it in the new Ram. Unfortunately, the connections were not the same, and I needed an adaptor. I called etrailer and was extremely happy with the service. Tammy looked up my truck and controller and matched the adaptor. The process took less than 3 minutes. I received the adaptor in just days. Thank you Tammy for making this easy.
I just installed my Curt TriFlex Trailer Brake Controller C51140 in my new 2019 Ram 1500 Laramie 4x4 Crew Cab. Thanks to the Curt Custom Wiring Adapter for Trailer Brake Controllers - Dual Plug In # C51458, it only took 4-5 minutes. Hardest part was finding the factory connector under the dash to plug into. etrailer has this wiring adapter listed as "Not confirmed to work" for the 2019 Ram 1500 but after my test drive I'm very satisfied. Worked just as I expected. I'll update this review after I have more time behind the wheel towing.
Super easy install taking me 5 minutes. Great product, exactly what I needed. Thank you etrailer!
It's very well made and would be simple to use, except two of the wires were switched. We used this with a 2018 Jeep Wrangler JL, but apparently they are switched on newer Dodge trucks too. Unfortunately, the effect was that the trailer brakes stayed permanently on.
I believe it was the brake signal and the 12V wires that were switched. Unfortunately, I don't remember for sure, but etrailer support knew exactly the issue and told me which two they were.
There are two ways to fix this. The ugly way is to cut and splice the wires to their correct place. That's the way most people recommend, but there is actually an even easier way with no cutting: remove the orange insert from the end the plugs into your car's wiring (I believe there were tabs on the side that I had to press to do so). Now, you will be able to remove the wires/contacts from the connector, so simply switch the two that need to be switched. Click the orange piece back into place. Voila, it's fixed, no cutting required.
Anyway, apart from that wire switching issue, it's a nice product.
Came in exactly as I expected, looked up under the dash and found the wire, should be a ten minute install. Sure makes it easy when etrailer has your vehicle specific cable for install. Will have to add more when I get to use it under tow with my RV trailer.
I only towed with it once and then I sold the truck I installed it in. I pulled the two axle camper bought 350 miles and it worked fine.
This harness made for a clean, splice-free install. I used this with a Jeep Gladiator which requires swapping the black and blue wires in the gray connector. The Gladiator is such a new truck, I could not find a good cross reference for the exact harness for a Curt Spectrum controller. I’m sure they have one by now or will very soon. I didn’t bother calling etrailer, I knew I could make this harness work. The wire swap took less than a minute, once you see the pin latches. Well worth the money to have a solid and clean install.
Rachael H.
8/22/2019
Curt does offer a wiring harness for the 2020 Jeep Gladiator and it is available as part # C51459. This harness has the correct plug configuration for the Gladiator and does not require swapping the black and blue wires.
Helpful Links
Connected to the OEM plug perfectly, works great on our Sunset 16 ft trailer.
Great controller! Easy to adjust even on the fly. I had the controller adjusted a little aggressive and as I was trying to get out of Buffalo to go south for the winter we ran into some snow accumulation and was able to quickly dial back the controller to avoid locking up on thick snow covered roads. Literally a potential disaster! Very happy with the controller
The product came very fast and it was super easy to install. It's working better than I thought, I'm very happy with www.etrailer.com and there products. Definitely worth every penny and everything top quality. Thanks!!!!
Purchased this controller for a 2004 Toyota Tundra Limited and it has preformed perfectly! I haven't had any complaints. It reacts and adjusts quickly. Along with the plug and play function there's not much more I can say. Great product!
Works well on a older truck , the new proportional controllers didn’t seem to be very effective on a older brake system.
Absolutely fantastic. I paid for express shipping and I got it! You don’t see that from many company’s! If you don’t buy from etrailer, you’re missing out on great service!
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Robert
3/13/2019
The cable install fit perfect and my system works great, the install was less than five minutes. Thanks etrailer!