[How To] I added a pair of car horns

[MarkinTexas]

I wanted to "announce my presence with authority!", so I installed a set of FIAMM El Grande Horns on my NT. The horns are located under the upper farings, which have to be removed for this installation.

I made a pair of mounting brackets from some metal stock I had on hand, more stout than they needed to be, but didn't have to run to the store. Easy to fabricate with a couple of ViseGrips and drill. I wrapped some electrical tape on the frame and fixed the bolt with a nut with a nylon insert.

I mounted one on each side, positioning them in front of the "pockets". They fix nicely.

Here's a view from the front.

I ran an inline 10A fuse to the battery to power the new horns through a relay.

The fused battery line was connected to #30 on the relay. The positive lead on both horns were wired together and connected to #87. The factory horn button was wired to #85 and I used #86 for ground. I spliced into the existing horn wiring as I wanted to keep the factory horn for it's high tone, as the FIAMMs are more of a low tone.

Once everything was confirmed to be working correctly, I wrapped it up in electrical tape and added some Velcro to the mounting tab on the relay.

I mounted the relay to the inside of the faring on a handy existing shelf.

Here's the relay tucked in front of the horn. The vents in the faring line up with the horns, so the sound escapes pretty well.

Here's a video of all the horns. it's much louder in person.

[video=youtube;YZt-Hv0OJUg]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YZt-Hv0OJUg[/video]

As I commute every day, this mod was a must. I get to test it a few times every week unfortunately. It's a pretty easy modification and I encourage anyone who drives in heavy traffic to include this on their NT. The horns were under $20 bucks on Amazon:

http://www.amazon.com/FIAMM-74100-El-Grande-Horns/dp/B000DLBIGG/ref=sr_1_fkmr0_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1440529956&sr=8-1-fkmr0&keywords=FIAMM+El+Grade

Keep the shiny side up!

 

[DirtFlier]

I had dual Fiamms for a while on my NT but the right side horn, which was mounted in the same place & direction as you've done, kept dying...twice!

Those slits in the front of the fairing allow water to come into that area and my theory is that water ruined the horn because the trumpet faced forward. On the left side, I mounted the horn under the tipover crash bar, behind the plastic, with the trumpet facing down so it never gave any trouble.

 

[charlie b]

I have dual Fiamms on the Goose. I like them!!

 

[MarkinTexas]

I had dual Fiamms for a while on my NT but the right side horn, which was mounted in the same place & direction as you've done, kept dying...twice!

Those slits in the front of the fairing allow water to come into that area and my theory is that water ruined the horn because the trumpet faced forward. On the left side, I mounted the horn under the tipover crash bar, behind the plastic, with the trumpet facing down so it never gave any trouble.

Thanks for the heads-up DT. I might have to angle them down as much as possible to reduce the amount of water that might get in there.

 

[DirtFlier]

With all the screwballs on the road, some of them "packing heat" and all with a 3500 pound moving object at their fingertips, I'd be careful about using the horn too much.

One thing I recall about that right pocket and my particular situation was the lack of space to turn the horn so the trumpet didn't face forward. Towards the rear of that cavity, directly in front of the fairing pocket is where I have the vacuum accumulator for my MC Cruise so I was forced to mount the horn way far forward. You probably have more room.

 

[Warren]

I am in agreement with Chris on not using my horn other than I don't use the horn to signal my agitation either. I do commute in heavy urban traffic and find it better to avoid and or remove myself from situations rather than using my horn to change others behavior. About the only time I use it is to get a pedestrians attention if it looks like they might step out in front of me and the stock horn is plenty loud enough to jerk them back to reality.

 

[charlie b]

My horn has alerted a few people that they were about to pull over into my lane. In each case I was braking pretty good at the time so I would not get sideswiped, but, I also prayed that the person behind me was going to notice and not ram me from behind. Yes, while my right hand and foot were on the brakes my left hand had pulled in the clutch and was hitting the horn button

It does serve a useful purpose in traffic.

The only times I use it as an "aggravation tool" is when people turn left in front of me after their light turns red.

And, yes, in the states out here 'road rage' is not a safe thing to incite. I assume that each person is armed (even though statistics say it is only 1 in 1000).

 

[Rmcapozzi]

Nice job. I like to place my relays in a more accessible location like under the seat just in case they go bad.

I too like to use my horn as a "reminder". I see someone at an intersection not looking my way, I will do two quick blasts of the horn to get their attention. I use it mostly as a preemptive tool and not afterwards. Either way, loud horns are a good tool to have. Thanks for posting!