Where to Connect the Red Wire of a Brake Controller in a 1995 Ford F-150

Published 10/07/2014

Question:

Hello, i have your plug.I have wired everything but i have a problem.At the back of my F-150 eddie bauer xlt 5.0. I have an oem in the back of truck for turn signals and so on.I need to no how to hard wire to the brake controller.Blue i have hard wired to control and the black wire of the control is ran to a hot line to feed the controller the white wire i secured to the dash inside for ground.I still have a red wire i dont no where it gets hooked into on the brake controller does the red wire need to be wired on brake controller ?Everything else works break lights,turn signals i am just concerned about hooking into the brake controller.I have an oem under the dash but the rest of the wires dont work so i used the hot line to feed the black power line to controller and hard wired the rest.My F-150 is a 1995.Confusing me.The brake controller should light up when i apply the breaks right or will that work when i hook up the 2 wires to the battery?I still havent hooked to the battery for the black and yellow I only have 1 30amp fuse for both of those wires.So basically what i did was wired the yellow and black together to a 30 amp fuse to go to the battery will that be o.k. or should i fuse them separate? Thank you for your help

asked by: Robert

Expert Reply:

For the red wire of your brake controller you will need to tap into the brake light switch of your 1995 Ford F-150. What you need to do is test the wires of the switch at the brake pedal to determine which of those wires sees voltage when the brakes are applied and none when released. That will be the circuit you attach the red wire of your brake controller to.

The brake controller should still power on though without this connection being made. As long as the power wire (black) and ground wire (white) are connected properly the controller should turn on. Not activate the brakes, but it should light up like it has power. Once the red wire is connected properly the brakes will apply of the trailer when the vehicle brakes are hit.

You will want to use a separate circuit breaker for the two wire you have run to the positive terminal of the battery.

I attached an FAQ on installing a brake controller from scratch that you should find helpful.

expert reply by: Jameson C