Do Powered Jacks Only Need One Wire Ran to Them

Updated 01/29/2025 | Published 02/15/2017

Question:

I have a pair of your jacks on each side of a salem camper/ice house that I want to replace soon. The ones that I see on your website show only one red wire coming from the unit to connect the power. The ones I have on my camper have a green, white, and red wire as hopefully shown in the picture I am attempting to send. Do the newer ones only require on wire now and would I just connect it to the existing connection?

asked by: Ross F

Expert Reply:

Most trailer jacks like the Lippert # LC285318 only use one wire. That wire provides the power and the assembly grounds through the mounting hardware of the jack.

It's hard to tell what's going on with the electric tape and splice connector I see on your current setup but new jacks would only need one wire.

expert reply by: Jameson C

click to enlarge

Brian B.

1/29/2025

The question should have been how to wire the new jack with one wire to the harness with three wires. The ice cabin has an interior leveling switch inside the cabin as well. So you can work the jack from the power head or from inside the cabin. I know the one wire from the new jack goes to the red fused wire on the three wire lead. How do you connect the green and white wire to make the interior switch work?

Jameson C.

1/29/2025

@BrianB I would need to know which specific jack you have so that I could look up a wiring diagram to answer that question.

Brian

1/29/2025

@JamesonC The only information on the jack are the initials LCI and the only information other than that is a serial number of 2012-08-0224. Does that help?

Jameson C.

1/29/2025

@Brian It doesn't narrow it down by much. I would assume the red wire is for 12 volt power, the green is for the interior switch, and the white is for ground.