Hopkins Towing Solutions 47185 Multi-Tow 4 Flat to 7 Blade and 4 Flat Adapter

First of all, THIS PRODUCT CONTAINS A MOUNTING BRACKET! For the first time ever, I didnt read reviews here before purchasing and bought a separate mounting bracket which Amazon lists as frequently purchased together. On the flip side though, I doubled up the brackets to make them a bit more sturdy. The bracket will bend backwards from the force of pushing the 7 pin plug in otherwise. The adapter itself is made of a thick plastic so corrosion shouldnt be an issue. Both covers work well and should keep out the elements though dielectric grease should be used as well. The wires are heavy (enough) gauge and have good jackets to them and the included crimp connectors are a nice bonus, though I always recommend soldering them. My only complaint is the cheap screws that come with it. Everything needed to mount it is included but its very soft steel and strips with little effort. Do yourself a favor and pick up some nice stainless screws at least for where it mounts to the vehicle.

Easy install

This install was not easy! Unless you have the capability to wire test or have the wire color diagram for your vehicle, its nearly impossible to install this with any accuracy. The manufacturers website and instructions that came with the product are not much help either. I spent 45 mins looking for my vehicles wire color designation for the trailer wiring harness and only found some guys description of the colors for my 2005 Suburban, which was dead on and made the install happen. Im very surprised that my super common vehicle was not easily found online. I also had to snip off the white ground connection so I could connect to my vehicles ground wire and not attach it to a metal spot on the vehicle, like the manufacturer suggests. I also had to cut off the 4 way connection it came with since I didnt have one already present on my vehicle. This also forced me to go purchase several new connectors to complete the install. In the end, my black vehicle wire connected to the new white harness wire, the red vehicle wire to the purple harness wire (the rest matched color for color except the dark green). As one may imagine, its any wonder why one wouldnt be able to use the harness for an easy install.

Works great. I had to change my factory 7 pin plug because I upgraded to a heavy duty hitch vs the factory one that was too small and I lost my mounting bracket that was attached from factory. There was someone else who talked about how flimsy the mounting bracket is and I have to say that has not been my experience. Used a couple oversized self tapping 5/16 sheet metal screws to hold it down screwed it in and it works perfect. Install was simple and sweet, wired into my Factory 01 Dodge Ram 2500 Cummins with butt connectors and heat shrink tubing, then taped it all up to protect any exposed wires. Will put up the wiring schematic for 2nd gen 98.5-02 rams if anyone else needs the info. Might be same for other Dodges, but I cant say. Center= purple/black tracer PL/BK back up lights 1 oclock= red/orange tracer RD/OR 12v Power 3 oclock= brown/red tracer BR/RD Right turn and brake 5 oclock= light blue LB Brake Controller 7 oclock= Black BK Ground , (mine has two black wires) 9 oclock= Green/red tracer GR/RD Left turn and brake 11 oclock= Black/orange tracer BK/OR Running lights.

Its all good, but I do have to hold onto the back of this plug when plugging in a trailer, or Ill bend the bracket back. The plug itself seems to work fine.

This item when I installed it looks and works great. We have a camper with a round 7 pin insert and waverunners on a trail with a flat 4 insert so this suits both well! The hardware that came with made the install a breeze and my wife was even impressed how nice it looks. Two words of warning though for us novices: 1) you have to ground the white wire even if you are hooking it up to an existing 4 flat connector. I drilled a small hole into my tow hitch underneath my car. 2) also when shipped the middle prong of the 7 pin adaptor is very tight- you need to separate the two clips to get your round 7 pin to fit correctly.

Received the Hopkins 47185 kit on time and in factory packaging. Nice that has both the 4 Pin and the 7 Pin Flat connectors. Just mounted the bracket and then place the connector unit into it with the supplied screws. The crimp connectors were already on each of the wires, so just matched the colors to the factory wires and crimped them on. Works great, put a little bit of grease on each pin and taped over each wire to seal moisture out.

I added this to an old Ford Explorer that only had a factory flat-4 trailer wiring harness. Now I have the option of towing a trailer with the RV style 7-pin or an old school flat-4 plug in it. The flat-4 portion plugs directly into the existing flat-4 wiring on the vehicle so you dont have to cut anything off of the vehicle. The only thing you have to wire in is 12V auxiliary power and back-up lights, but only if you need them. Since my trailer does not use either of those options I just taped those wires up and left them there in case I want to wire them in later. It also comes with a mounting bracket and screws so mounting it is a piece of cake. I only had to drill two holes to mount the bracket. I would definitely buy again.

The hardest part is found the wiring diagram for LR3 but it work, just follow booth diagrams and its gonna take around 25 min.

The 4 way plug was a nice feature. I didnt need to splice that connector in. I just used my existing trailer plug. I did have to make a new ground on the truck side, probably to handle the extra load from the trailer brakes and the aux power to the trailer. The mounting bracket seems a little flimsy. But it works. Use two hands to connect and disconnect and you should be fine. I like not having to use a 7 way to a 4 way adapter for my different trailers.