Mounting Bracket for Tekonsha P3 Brake Controller
The Tekonsha P3 is a very popular brake controller for towing travel trailers. Unfortunately the 2 mounting brackets come with the P3 are poorly designed. The plastic bracket feels very flimsy; the 3 tiny screws come with it don’t provide much strength on soft plastic found in most car’s under-dash panels. This makes it almost impossible to securely mount the controller under dash panel. When I took the delivery from Spokane Airstream dealership, It fell off 2 hours into the return trip and I had to use duct tape as a temporary solution.
After I got home I designed a 3D printable mounting bracket and it has worked flawlessly in past 18 months.
- It doesn’t require screws – The back of the bracket provides a large contact area so it can be securely mounted with double-sided tape (3M Scotch 5952 VHB). You can remove the bracket by sliding a string into the gap then move the string back and forth to loosen it up.
- Low profile, it doesn’t stick out as much as the stock brackets, which makes it far less prone to your knee bumping into the controller when you get on/off your car.
- The controller can be easily detached when it’s not in use.
Instructions
- Click here to download 3D printable STL files
- Print them. it must be printed vertically, with support on print bed to provide great strength.
- Dry fit the bracket against the under-dash panel, It’s perfectly fine if the curve doesn’t match the panel perfectly – you can accommodate this by
- Under-dash panel has a tighter curve than that of the bracket – apply double-sided tape at top and bottom edge of the bracket.
- The Bracket has a tighter curve than that of the under-dash panel – apply 2 layers of double-sided tape at the top and bottom edges of the bracket
- Important! Clean surfaces of under-dash panel, bracket using Isopropyl Alcohol. let them dry.
- Apply double sided tape to mounting bracket, peel off the tape backing, press it against the under-dash panel for 30 seconds.
- Let the bracket rest for 12 hours without inserting the brake controller.
- As a bonus, I also designed a cable clip for controller’s cable management.
Hope this is useful, you can also find more 3D printable accessories for Airstreams here.
2 Comments
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Any chance you’d share the source file or at least a step file? I’ve tried to VHB tape this on and I just can’t get enough surface contact for it to hold. I’ve tried stacking the tape as mentioned in your blog to no success as well
Anthony, thank you for the comment. Have you tried to clean the surfaces well? mine is on my car for almost 3 years now, it’s rock solid.