The Stovebolt Site Forums The Shop Area The Electrical Bay Horn wiring question

I have a 1953 3/4 ton pickup.

I want to redo the horn button to operate with the steering wheel button instead of the aftermarket switch taped to the steering column.

There is one wire coming out of the steering column and one wire coming out of my horn.

The po ran a hot wire to the aftermarket switch and another wire to the horn.

what do I do?

thanks

Your horn button is usually the ground that when depressed completes the circuit allowing the horn to honk. If you have a wire coming out of the steering column it's probably the horn button wire. I would try connecting it to the wire going to the horn & see it that works. It's possible the PO put the button on the side of the column because the stock button didn't work correctly.

Jim Lee,

As AD_Pickup pointed out several days ago, '53 was the first year for the horn relay on these trucks.

One terminal on your horn would support this statement.

When you indicate you have a wire coming out of your steering column, I assume you mean a 'factory' wire exiting near the steering box proper. This isn't to be confused with something taped to the outer column, or obviously stuck on by the previous owner.

The fact that another button was installed might mean the factory one doesn't work, or is grounded all the time.

This wire (factory) needs to be tested to make sure it ISN'T grounded until you toot the horn.

A ohm meter could do this task.

If the wire is good, it needs to be attached to a horn relay, which as Tiny indicates, operates a normally open contact which can pass a higher current to the horn for a nice loud blast.

This post is reading like the old testament...check out your 'factory' wire, and maybe even pull the wheel to investigate the little contact. If all is well, someone will fill in the remaining wiring details.

I think a factory horn relay might be located on the firewall, above the steering box, in the corner. If your truck has been converted to 12 volts, this may be the reason for the aftermarket button.

Stuart

My truck has had a sick horn sound for the day I picked it up. So I have bought some off ebay.
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.

That is what relays are for. Horns used to be adjustable.