Escape Trailers offers an optional Exterior 12V/USB Outlet for $66 located on the passenger side under rear clearance light.
It's a dual mount containing both a “cigarette lighter” socket and a USB double socket that looks sort of like this stock photo.
The USB sockets quit working on our 2020 5.0. Using my multimeter, I checked and found power to the cigarette lighter socket so I figured the USB double socket was bad and should be replaced.
These panel mount sockets are normally easy to take out by removing the plastic lock ring on the back so I wormed my way inside under the passenger seat. Here’s a picture of what I found, looking down the side wall of the trailer.
The locking ring was there but whoever installed the sockets believed that if a little silicone caulk was a good thing then a whole lot of it smeared over everything must be even better. So let’s just say it took me a lot of cutting, twisting and prying to get the whole thing apart.
Yes, the problem was the USB double socket charger. Just a wee bit of corrosion on the electronics, don’t you know.
Replacement chargers are pretty cheap but I decided against simply replacing the bad one with something like this for a couple of reasons.
The whole setup really isn’t waterproof and whatever replacement charger I would get would probably corrode again in a couple more years. Plus, the kind of charger you want will keep changing, all with the changing standards of different USB sockets and things like Quick Charge and Power Delivery Protocols.
So I bought another cigarette lighter power socket and now have a dual cigarette lighter power socket.
Now I can get a handful of car chargers and just plug them in whenever I need them. They start at $15 or so for the basic ones and go up from there for the fancier models with more features. Besides, I can pull them out when not needed to keep them from corroding. Here’s one of the fancy ones with Quick Charging, Power Delivery and a 65 watt Power Delivery USB-C port.
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