Video Transcript for Feature Breakdown: Mini LED Trailer Clearance or Side Marker Light

Hey everybody, Ryan here at etrailer. Today we're gonna be checking out and showing you how to install the Optronics mini LED clearance or side marker light. A lot of times, you know, lights on trailers just flat out go bad, they get some age to 'em, they sit outside a lot and they just quit working well like ours here. So we opted to go for an LED, more or less a direct replacement to what we have already. And being that we're LED these should last a lot longer compared to the older and candescent light bulbs. This particular light is gonna have one LED and shines nice and bright, you know, uses very minimal power to get it to illuminate.

And so you're primarily gonna use these on the front of your trailer or the sides. There's these available with red lights as well. So if you're putting some on the back of your trailer, whatever, that's always an option for you. And probably the big thing with me, you know, is figuring out are these gonna work with your particular application If you're gonna be adding them, you know not really a big deal, you can make it work, right But if you're gonna replace an existing light one thing that I hate doing is having to drill unnecessary holes. So to figure out if your existing mining locations will work with this one, which they're relatively standard.

From center hole to center hole, it's gonna be an inch and seven eights. The actual length of the whole light itself is gonna be two and a half inches. It's gonna be an inch and one eights tall and five eights of an inch thick. One thing I do like about these is the clear lens and that might not be for everyone, but I'm a fan of 'em. I think it makes the trailer look a little more modern and these are just less noticeable when they're not on as compared to the, you know, your orange lenses there.

That definitely stick out a little bit more but that's just my opinion. If you'd rather have an orange lens, there's plenty other options available right here at etrailer. If you take a look at the back of the light all this stuff inside of here where all the electronics are is sealed it's hard to tell cause it's clear, but you know, moisture and things like that definitely will have a much harder time getting in. And matter of fact, this is a submersible light. So if it's on a boat trailer something or out in the weather, shouldn't have much to worry about.

I do suggest though, if you completely submerse it, turn the power off it'll just help prolong the life of it. And since this is a one wire type light this will be your power wire. The ground is actually gonna be the strap here. So when you put your bolt through and attach to the trailer, that's gonna touch the metal portion of our trailer and provide us with the ground. So whenever you do mount this up it is gonna have to be on a metal portion of the trailer. That way it can get an appropriate ground. If you don't have that particular situation, no big deal. You can always get lights like this that have a two wire and that way you're able to actually hook the wire up to your ground wherever it may be. That's really about it though. I mean, honestly, if you're gonna be replacing or adding lights, really no reason not to go with an LED, at least in my opinion. Chances are pretty good, you know, it'll be the last time you'll have to mess with it. They just last for, for such a long time. As far as the installation goes, really straightforward. So why don't we get into that right now Now keep in mind everyone's situation's gonna be a little bit different, but today we're gonna be using it as a clearance light on an enclosed trailer. But generally speaking, the same information will apply to, you know, just about all of them, whether it's one like this, utility trailer, anything along those lines. First thing you want to do is remove your old light and if the wiring's in good shape, you can always just work off of that, which ours is. So I'm gonna cut. Cut that off there. We're gonna strip back the insulation, give that wire a twist and I'm gonna use the heat shrink butt connector. This will slide over the end and we'll crimp it down. With this wire having the butt connector on it, we'll simply take our new light, strip back insulation on it a little bit, plug that in and crimp it down. And I'm using heat shrink type butt connectors. These help prevent corrosion. And the ends will seal up. So I'll come in with my heat source and then get that done. Since the light's ground is that strap there and it'll touch the metal portion of our trailer's top rail here. You wanna make sure that surface is clean. So you know, I took some sandpaper, just kind of, clean off the surface there. And pretty straightforward from here. We'll just simply line it up, take our screws. And get it secured. Last thing we need to do now is just simply test it to make sure it's working properly. So I plugged into a test box you can use your truck or whatever but keep in mind if that has any issues, might mislead into thinking it's something you did on the trailer side. But we'll go ahead and turn on our running lights and check it out. So it looks like our light is working the way it should and that's how easy it is to put in. If you picked up any more of these, you'd simply just repeat that same process to get those done. But with that said, that'll finish up our look at and our installation of the Optronics amber LED clearance or side marker light.