Subject: Ton Jaspers explains the beautifully available European trailer lights board
----- Original Message -----
From: Wayfarer W10445
Sent: Wednesday, May 05, 2010 11:54 AM
Subject: ready-made lightboards commercially available in Europe

Hi Al,
 
A ready made (plastic) lighting board with everything on it (lights, bulbs, reflective triangles, etc.) goes for 13,50 over here (10 dollars?) and it even includes the rubber power cable and plug to the car. If it is only a light board you need? I have trailered for years with one of those cheap, ready-made lighting boards, hung from the transom with two ropes fixed to my mooring cleats.
 
Best wishes,
Ton
OMG. I suddenly realised that you guys may not know those ready made PVC light boards like, for example, these:





----- Original Message-----
From: Al Schonborn [mailto:uncle-al3854@cogeco.ca]
Sent: donderdag 6 mei 2010 3:26
To: Wayfarer

I have seen them on your boats over in Europe but don't believe they are available here. If one were ordered from your side of the Atlantic, would it work here??
 
Best regards,
 
Uncle Al  (W3854)


----- Original Message -----
From: Wayfarer
Sent: Wednesday, May 05, 2010 10:23 PM

Sure, why not?  They are 12 volt. Not sure about the plug though. Do you guys use that round 7-pole plug, too? 
Boards have triangular reflectors, mandatory in Europe. The triangles show 1. its a trailer and 2. the width of the trailer.
I originally had a lighting board on two long poles underneath the boat but I lost that on the second corner in Emsworth coming from Porter's.
Today I have a board as small as my transom to avoid windage. The triangles I moved to the splash guards of the wheels where they show the width of the trailer as required by law. I don't know if it is totally legal but it passed its mandatory (every five years) inspection a few months ago. 
  
The boards also have a separate fog light (mandatory in the EU since 2006). UK ones on the right, continental ones on the left. (Same board only the triangles are upside down). The 7-pole connector does not have a fog light pin but the law conveniently does not say where the light switch needs to be located ;-) My switch sits next to the light on the board itself ;-) Next to fog light, boards usually have two comi-lights (luminaires?) each with a brake light, a main light and a direction light. The luminaires are very much the same as the ones I found on US web-sites. 
 
BTW, the sites I passed on earlier were just the first hits I got in Google. They are by no means cheap addresses!  Almost every caravan store and dinghy chandler carries them over here.   Another quick search produced this one. 
 
Best wishes,
Ton


----- Original Message-----
From: Al Schonborn [mailto:uncle-al3854@cogeco.ca]
Sent: donderdag 6 mei 2010 16:45
To: Wayfarer
Cc: Chris Walden W1395

Thanks, Ton. I will add your notes to the coverage. Though our requirements are simpler here:


a flat 4-prong plug is used by nearly all small-boat sailors.
 
Best regards,
 
Uncle Al  (W3854)