Horn Rebuild?

[cwinston]

Can a 6 volt horn be rebuilt? What's involved? I cleaned up the contact points on my 51 Champion and found one horn to work, but the other sounds more like bacon sizzling than a horn.

Before I drilled out the rivits I figured I would ask you guys here if it was worth my time.

Thanks

[64V-K7]

I tried to renovate a few 6V horns and never had much luck. It a bit tedious to get them opened and apart without breaking something. Some work with a little cleaning, others won't any longer, I suppose because of rust and bad grounds. Parts are almost impossible to find, especially the paper gaskets and diaphragms. You can zap them to life with a 12V battery, sometimes, but only short bursts. If you can find 6 volt motorcycle horns, use them.

Bob Johnstone

[cwinston]

I kind of thought that, but I'd rather my car sound like a car, not a pipsqueak beep.

Has anyone run across a supplier of these? I've been looking but am not having much luck.

[r1lark]

We had a discussion on 6v horns on the Studebaker Newsgroup a while back.

Here is the link:

http://groups.google.com/group/alt.autos.studebaker/browse_thread/thread/5620a661f8dcd32f/d74027ab888ea79a?lnk=gst&q=Paul+horn+6v&rnum=2&hl=en#d74027ab888ea79a

Hope this helps a little!

Paul

Visit The Studebaker Skytop Registry website at: http://hometown.aol.com/r1skytop/myhomepage/index.html

[55s]

Funny, I have been lucky in getting them to work.

Clean up the contacts, and make sure that there is full power to them. (no paint)(they require several amps and thick wiring).

Buzzing usually indicates it is close to working, but the gap is wrong on the contacts. Try closing the contacts a little more. You have to fiddle with them.

Good luck.

P.S.: The six volt horns on my 1955 sound like a train, and they sound great. The covers were rusted off, so I just left them off.

Paul

[cwinston]

Well you can't break something if it's already broke, right? So I decided to take apart the horn today. I believe I found what was causing the problem.

1. The coil is broke / burnt. Can I just solder it back together or should I try to rebuild a new coil / armature?

2. In the process of getting to the coil I broke what I think is an old resistor. It looks like a very thin wire wraped around a ceramic tooth pick. I didn't break the wire just the ceramic, and it reads about 2 ohms resistance from one end to the other.

Now I can't seem to find a 2 ohm resistor, so can I solder (2) 1 ohm resistors together?

I sure hope an electrical engineer is reading tonight.

[avantilover]

Why not just get a couple of old Chrysler Road Runner horns the Beep Beep ones they'd sound great LOL.

John Clements
Avantilover, your South Australian Studebaker lover!!!
Lockleys South Australia

[Kdancy]

I just did two horns from a 55. Neither one would work. Cut the rivets off, cleaned everything real well, filed the points. put them back together using stainless bolts and nuts, then painted the housings.
They now Work and sound great!

53commander HDTP
53 Champion HDTP
61 Cursed Purple Hawk
64 Champ long bed V8

[studebaker-R2-4-me]

To answer the question two 1 ohm resistors in Series will equal 2 ohms. Surely your local radio shack will have a two ohm resistor. the purpose of the ceramic is to dissipate the heat in the resistor.

1964 GT Hawk soon to be R2 Clone

[goodkarmech]

I had both horns inop on my 53 commander. I still have them, but was lucky enough to find 2 horns on ebay off of a 55 plymouth which worked and had similar mounting brackets. I had to make new wires to run from the plymouth horns to the relay because the wires were not part of the plymouth horns. I also have a pair of 6 volt horns mounted on one bracket and I know at least one of them works.
I am willing to part with either or all of them. If someone on the list is interested, I can take digital pics and send them, and can test the horns to refresh my memory as to which one(s) work.
Question, Is it possible to clean the points without disassembling the horn rivets?

[StudeRich]

GOODKAR; I have a customer that is handicapped and REALLY needs these horns badly, because he cannot register his
car in Calif. without a complete inspection and they must work, he needs a High tone horn for a '53 "C" body coupe.
They usually say Hi, & Lo or H & L.

If you can hold-on, he will try to log on here and post. -2:34PM PDT Weds. April 11, 07. Or email me, by clicking on
"StudeRich" for his phone number.

StudeRich
Studebakers Northwest
Ferndale, WA