The Stovebolt Site Forums The Shop Area The Electrical Bay Q. About Original Horns

How do I determine if I have original horns on my truck? I was at my first car show yesterday and was parked next to a 57 Chevy . Since I just relocated the horns on my truck (left & right of the radiator), I'm "horn aware" and noticed the horns on his Chevy were much larger than mine. So I asked him to sound his horns for me and they were MUCH lower in pitch than mine!

The opening-end of his horns were nearly twice as large as mine, too ... so now I'm wondering.

I know there are adjustment screws on the horns so you can change the pitch, and I plan on playing around with those, but my horns were like two octaves higher in pitch than his and his sounded MUCH nicer, too!

So now I'm on a horn hunt!

Can anyone enlighten me? Does anyone sell original horns? I don't see them in my Chevy Duty catalog.

I'm going to move this to the electrical bay unless you are planning on painting or removing the dents from your original horns.

Unless your going for total originality, I use Cadillac horns.
There are 4 of them, and the sound is awesome and distinctive.
I also have them on my Miata, They get noticed.
Unlike the Meepmeep OEM.

Thanks, Rogue 64

Caddy horns, eh? Yeah ... I'm not concerned with original, just with a good 50s sound!

Does it matter what year? I love the horn sounds of the 50s ... in fact, I just love the 50's -- period! -- when it comes to cars and trucks ... and I imagine Caddy horns from the 80s aren't what you're talking about, right?

But that's a grand idea ... time to take a trip to the good ol' scrap yard!

Alan,

"Can anyone enlighten me? Does anyone sell original horns? I don't see them in my Chevy Duty catalog."

The '54 (and I think '53) trucks came with a low-note horn, and a high-note optional horn was available. The car had the same horns but different mounting brackets. The horns have "mirror image bodies". In 1954, both horns mounted on the radiator frames but in '53 the regular horn mounted on the radiator frame and the high-note horn mounted on the intake manifold (odd looking).

Chev's of the 40's used to have the standard horn but I have never seen any vendor selling the accessory horn. They are both available on eBay every so often (search on combinations of " '53, 1953, '54, 1954, Chev* horn* " ).

The sound you are describing seems to be mellower (lower) than the original dual horns but, so what?

Good luck,
Tim

Bowtie Bits carries original horns ... occasionally ... at $45 each. They are presently out of stock, but referred me to Tom Myers at 1 (918) 542-3871 -- he has them (6 volts) ... I have his email if anybody wants it, but I won't post it here (so he doesn't get spammers picking up his email address) -- if you want it, email me via my site.

I used horns from the '70's, but my mother had a '92 Fleetwood that had the same sound.

There cheep-cheep at PnP, but make sure you get all 4. (2 in each fender)

The have had that Caddy sound as long as I can remember.

This really sounds like a case of "horn envy" I think you should be happy with what you have. Remember, its not the size of your horn but how you use it that matters!

I just couldn't resist!