welcome to the to start training top tips or uncoupling and coupling car and trailer the vehicle we're using here is a Toyota Hilux towing a box trailer first thing we're going to go through is the uncouple so the very first bit is to make sure we're selecting a safe and legal place to uncouple our trailer making sure it's strong enough to support the weight of the trailer and the jockey wheel once we've stopped applying the handbrake and select neutral in the vehicle switch off the engine and remove the key remember it's very easy for somebody just to drive away while you're working at the back of the vehicle apply the trailer parking brake and release and lower the trailer jockey wheel make sure you lower that jockey wheel all the way to the ground and lock it off nice and firmly next thing is to lift up the coupler handle and continue to lower the jockey wheel using the mechanism until the trailer and car becomes separated make sure you get enough distance between the two next thing is to release and stow the trailer electrical connection for the lights making sure it's not going to get in the way and release and stowed the trailer breakaway cable so that procedure again before you apply the trailer parking brake release and lower the jockey wheel all the way to the floor lock it off nice and firmly so it's not going to slip lift the coupler handle and continue to lower the jockey wheel until the car and trailer separate getting enough clearance so nothing catches on the way out remove the electrical connection and stow it away nice and safely so it doesn't get damaged and remove the trailer breakaway cable don't forget once you've done this to go to the back of the trailer and remove your number plate so that you don't leave that behind so to recap there for the uncoupling procedure apply the trailer parking brake release and lower the jockey wheel to the ground lock that off nice and firmly lift a couple of handles and continue to lower the jockey we'll get enough clearance from the vehicle disconnecting to stow the electrical and breakaway cable and remove the trailer number plate don't forget that the breakaway cable is the last thing to become disconnected you can then drive away from under the under the trailer next thing we're going to do is cover the coupling procedure the very first thing we need to do before coupling is to ensure that we carry out our trailer checks very vital these it's gonna be critical that we make sure that we get the correct trailer don't pick up somebody else's and we double check what weight we can carry what the gross weight of the trailer is what we're allowed to have on the road first thing is to ensure that the trailer parking brake is applied check the security and condition of the electrical cable and the breakaway cable and then carry out your standard trailer checks so as you can see there we're check-in the tire tread depth which with this trailer is one point six mil across three quarters of the width of the tire all the way around check in the security of the wheel nuts and ensuring that we do these checks on both those tires also check in the suspension and the spray suppression as well and any connected lights and reflectors for their security it's a good opportunity to go to the back of the vehicle and check the security of the load in our vehicle here we have an intermediate bulk container which we're going to shut the doors there and secure them nice and firmly ensure that the top and bottom locks are in place and that our correct number plate has been affixed can then start reversing towards our trailer make sure you stop far enough away you can get out that driving seat walk back and make sure you check the height of the coupling if the trailer was last uncoupled by vehicle with a different height tow ball we might have to adjust the height with the jockey wheel but once we're happy with the height we can reverse our tow ball under the coupling there are very various methods are doing this you might have marks on the trailer or camera systems like we have but don't forget if you don't get it exactly right as long as you're close enough to attach the breakaway cable you can always maneuver it by hand here you can see the camera in the rear view mirror that can assist us with our positioning first thing once we've done that is to check the condition again and connect the trailer breakaway cable make sure that's affixed to affirm point on the vehicle that's going to hold that cable should we breakaway I'm going to check the condition so the pins again of the electrical connection and make sure that we connect that cable nice and firmly into its housing so it's not going to be caught by anything it's also going to be extremely important when connecting our breakaway cable and our electrical cable that we make sure that we've got sufficient clearance from the ground so they're not dragging along the floor and that we have enough room for leverage of the trailer so when we're going around corners it's not going to be tugging on the electrical cable or the breakaway cable once we've connected the two of those we can start coupling up the trailer so we're gonna lift up the coupler handle and start to lower down that jockey wheel on our vehicle we have a little coupling safety indicator a little red pin that sticks out however that's not quite good enough we need to lower the jockey wheel down and see the vehicle rising with it so we know it's nice and secure fully release and stow away that jockey wheel being mindful of ground clearance and release the trailer parking brake next thing we need to do is to check that the trailer lights are working correctly we've already connected the electrical cable and we've checked the security of our lights when we were doing our trailer check but we need to check their function so as we walk back we can see that the offside trailer marker light is working there when we get to the back of the trailer we need to check any hazard lights any indicators and most importantly the brake lights any fog lights or reversing lights that may be fitted to your trailer as well so to sum up that coupling procedure then we're going to carry out that trailer check first gonna make sure we have a nice physical check of the parking brake to make sure that's applied we're then going to carry out all of our normal checks so our tire tread depths the condition of the tires our security of the wheel nuts we're going to check out the suspension the spray suppression all that stuff you'd normally expect to check once you're happy with the trailer we're going to reverse towards it stopping far enough away to check the height of our coupling once we're happy with the height we're going to reverse the tow ball underneath the coupler we're going to stop there apply the handbrake select neutral switch off the engine now we go into our coupling procedure so this stage we're going to check and connect the breakaway cable first remember that's always last when we're uncoupling first one the coupling we're gonna check and connect the electrical cable making sure it can't be damaged by the tow ball as we lower the trailer on lift up that couple our handle and raise the jockey wheel which will connect the trailer and the vehicle once we've done that we're gonna let go that coupler handle and test the coupling by lowering the jockey wheel to raise the vehicle if we're happy that we're safely coupled we're going to retract and stow the jockey wheel be mindful of ground clearance remove the trailer parking brake ensure the correct number plate is affixed of the trailer and then check our lights so that's it we're all coupled up ready to go always coupling and couple to this procedure and you shouldn't have any problems at all you
