I picked up two 6 volt horns, both high and low note.My question is..can I wire them in series and have them work correctly to replace my single horn? They are going into a 3100 6 volt truck. Thanks
No. You could wire them in series if you were installing them in a 12 volt truck. In a 6 volt truck you will need to wire them in parallel. It's simple. Just wire one terminal on each to the positive 6 volts coming from the horn relay and one terminal on each horn to the other terminal on the horn (usually the side that goes to the horn button). That way each horn gets the required 6 volts to toot. Wiring them in series would essentially take the 6 volts and divide it in half to each horn (3 volts each). You would be lucky if you heard it click when you hit the horn button.
These horns only have one terminal [pig-tail]. Naturally ground completes the circuit. So I don't think I can do what you mentioned. Any other ideas? These horns by the way came off of a early 50 GMC truck. Thanks....Bob
There's no reason you can't run both horns off one hot wire.Just make a jumper from one horn to the other.
Horns will use a LOT of current. If you truck does not have a horn relay you really should install one.
Bob ; Are these the trumpet horns or the snail typ ? either are very good and the fact that they only have _one_ terminal tells you they're high current consumers and require a relay , wire the relay so grounding it when you press the horn button sends current to them and ALWAYS wire horns in paralell ! . 6 or 12 volts makes no differance . Just don't lean on the horn for over 30 seconds if you're running 12 volts through a 6 volt horn . If your horn ever stops tooting , remove the cover and file the points a bit , remember thatadjust only needs 1/16 to 1/8 turn , more and you may wreck the horn beyond repair . Happy tooting ! -Nate (horn lover)
I have two trumpet horns, one came on the truck and one I bought off ebay, and two snail horns off a 52 cad I bought off ebay (THEY APPEAR NOT TO WORK) and a set of never been used in the original battered-box DELCO REMY 6 volt replacement horns, (ONE D1930 1880226 A-F NOTES KLAXON HORN PACKAGE) I also bought off ebay. The trumpet horn which came on the truck #1 only sputtered a noise when you pushed the stock button, so I had it changed when I had the truck rewired the second #2 trumpet horn sounded like a sick steer calling. So today I poked around under the hood seeing if some grounding was the problem. I replaced the #1 and it came to life, not a bad beep-beep sound. I also re-bolted #2 in better and it came to life with a normal high pitched sound. I cleaned all the connection points and tried it again and nothing. I noticed where the people whom re-wire it had installed a 15amp fuse with an 18 gauge wire to it 12or14ga is what the wiring harness came with. I changed the blown fuse, disconnected #2 and got a small beep out of #1 push the button again and nothing. Checked the fuse and it wasn’t blown. Then checked to see if #2 would work, nothing. Went and retrieved the Delco box and installed the never been used horns with relay parallel wired to a horn button on the column. WHAT A NICE SOUND !!!! Question 1; can the 2 post horns be connected to a relay?, That is if I can get them to work again. Question 2; can the snail horn with rivets be drilled out and worked on. If so is there anything out there which talks about reconditioning those things? This got really long winded, sorry .
Old Horn Service Yes , you can open up old horns and clean the points off then they'll work as new again , the adjustment is really critical and delicate , just adjust to where the points are barely closing then juice the horn whilst bolted to a _solid_ surface and adjust for loudest toot . You can (& should) use a relay in all horn applications ~ either wire it to ground the horn if the horn has two terminals or wire it to juice the horn of it only has one terminal . The relay protects the horn button's delicate contacts , you must _NEVER_ use dual horns without a relay . Remember too : two horns that sound awful seperately , will sound GREAT when tooted to-gether ! . This is the cheap way to cobble up dual horn sets ups ~ get goofy sounding horns and mix one high tone with one low tone for a nice mellow sound .
Old Horn Service Thanks Nate. I cleaned the horn button area taking off a lot of age coating with some emery cloth. The # 1 trumpet horn is working now from the stock button area; I still kept the added klaxons. I'm going to add another relay and add the #2 trumpet and see what sound I get. Still have not tried those snail horns off that 53 caddy. Again Thanks.
Cleaning Elect. Contacts Oh crap ! I forgot to mention that you should _NEVER_ sand switch contacts ~ only polish them using metal polish ~ please open it back up again and polish the contact ring with your choice of metal polish untill it's shiny& glossy ~ failure to do this will likley result in the contacts burning out before long . I like to smear a thin coating of bearing grease over the clean & shiny contact points too to keep them working forevermore . do not use ' Dialetric ' grease ! that's for high tension ignition connections ONLY ! .
I've used a product called "Flitz" to polish metals with really good success. it's non abrasive and leaves no residue.
Cleaning Elect. Contacts Thanks for the warning Nate; I did not touch those contacts with the emery cloth. Was about to but got side tracked on something else at the time. When I got back I just put all the stuff back together. Again Thanks.
