Horn Relocation

[al_roethlisberger]

Should we take this discussion to the SouthWest List?

http://www.topica.com/lists/MGNOC-SW/read

You don't have to live in the south west to participate.

You just have to have an OPINION (but even NON-Opinions will do.)

Right now the politics have leveled off, but throw in a subjectline like "Gun Control Makes ME Want To KILL Someone" or "I told you the War was a mistake"

and watch the fun begin.

Good bunch of guys, opinion aside.

[al_roethlisberger]

On a more important note....

Best wishes and prayers to V11Sport owner Jim Phillips who probably lost 2 cats, his house, and his Guzzi in today's fire.

It is truely a nightmare here for many people.

I am one of the lucky ones, sitting at home, trying to conserve water and electricity, windows closed, with irritated eyes and a headache from all the smoke

 

How awful, best wishes to him.... Poor folks

[al_roethlisberger]

Back on topic.... while installing my new forks this evening, I too noticed that the horns(or aftermarket ones) could easily be installed up in the fairing. As we've mentioned before, there's a lot of room "up there"... and if you get behind the "dashboard" there's even more

 

Perhaps while I'm in the wiring next week to fix the clutch safety switch SNAFU, I'll move them or get it all wired up for some FIAMMs

 

If I do though, I really need to build some sort of junction box/ bar for the battery. As it is now, I've got too many wires going directly to the battery terminals for my taste(even stock it's bad) and if I add a horn feed, that's just one more

 

al

[dlaing]

That reminds me, that the fact that the starter relay's terminal going to the lighting, horn, etc. is underated, should really get people motivated to fix it. Right?

I still don't have a fix.

I will probably just put a larger relay in its place.

[al_roethlisberger]

Yeah, I was thinking about that, and hence will probably put in another relay for the horns if I move them and power them off of the battery directly.

 

al

[callison]

That's how I did mine. I've long since pulled the photos from my posting, but I can dig them up if someone is really interested.

[al_roethlisberger]

....well, this should be the easiest of jobs, but believe it or not this is giving me mild "fits"

 

I hooked up the horns via a relay, and connected them directly to the battery(via my heated grips harness I made a while back) and when "honked" they now sound like they've got cotton jammed up the horns

 

....hook them directly to the OEM horn wires though, and ....they'll blow your ears off.

 

Sounds like a bad ground to me, so I'll be investigating, but it's just one of those "it figures" moments.

 

BTW, I moved mine up in the fairing, beside the oil-cooler as suggested earlier. It does clean up the front of the engine a bit.

 

And OMG are these things loud, incredible. I had no idea how wimpy the stock horns were until I hit the horn button for a quick test with these("138db" horns) hooked up. Sh#t!

 

I'm sure I'll get it sorted out tonight. And BTW, I don't have a quality meter to test the draw on these, but as mentioned elsewhere, it's definitely somewhere between 5 and 8ish amps for both, as I blew the 5 amp fuse, but a 7.5 seems to be holding up so far....

 

It's really too bad we can't just use the stock harness without eating up the switch, as that would be such an easy swap ...and it works

 

al

[docc]

Al, Ive been running a pair of Fiamms through two ( one each to have redundant systems) of the siemens relays wired through to the battery. The 7.5 amp fuse has held up to some repeated and sustained use.

 

The only thing that bothers me is the stack of terminals on the battery posts.

[dlaing]

Al,

Are you blowing a 5 amp fuse from the main fuse block when using the stock horn wires?

I ask because I was under the impression that the horn was fused by the 15amp lighting fuse. Does the Lemans have a different wiring diagram than what is included in the 2000 workshop manual?

Docc,

Which 7.5A fuse are you talking about?

[docc]

David,

 

I put a 7.5a fuse in line from the battery to my two separate Siemans relays on their way to the Fiamms.

 

Horns mounted on the original brackets, relays along the right side of the spine connected to the original wires from the switch.

 

I, too, started with a 5a in line but kept smokin' em

[al_roethlisberger]

Al,

Are you blowing a 5 amp fuse from the main fuse block when using the stock horn wires?

I ask because I was under the impression that the horn was fused by the 15amp lighting fuse. Does the Lemans have a different wiring diagram than what is included in the 2000 workshop manual?

Docc,

Which 7.5A fuse are you talking about?

 

The V11 Sport/LeMans fuse-block has an extra unused terminal/slot at the rear, that I used for my heated grip installation last year. I just tapped into and used that for the new horn installation since the harness I built has power from the relays, and a return all the way to the battery ground. The power comes from the signal lights power lead into the fuse block.

 

I was using a 5a fuse in that slot, and promptly blew it But I expected that, so no big deal.

 

The stock horn circuit is going through whatever fuse/relay it always was, but now is simply powering the new relay for the new horns.

 

al

[dlaing]

Oh good! Nothing to worry about.

And speaking of nothing to worry about, Jim Phillips' house, motorcycle, and cats are all well.

But it was close!

[al_roethlisberger]

....and oh BTW, let me just add that I HATE these horns

 

OK, some background

 

Well, remember how I was complaining that I was having some issues getting a consistenly solid, clear, and loud honk out of these guys??

 

At first I believed it was a grounding issue, or perhaps some other issue with a good clean circuit. So I fixed that. Nope...

 

It was very frustrating because I could hook the stock horn hookups, or my new harness, to the horns when unmounted, and they were like freakin' banshees. But bolt them up, and tighten everything down and.... "wonk"... sounds like they have cotten shoved down the horns

 

Well, I'm going to cut to the chase.... after much tinkering, I discovered something I didn't realize, and wasn't mentioned in the instructions. It turns out that if you look at our stock horns, or the aftermarket units, they are mounted at the end of two strips of "spring steel". I thought these were simply "brackets", but it apears that these brackets are instead tuned to work with the horns. It seems that if one mounts the horns without these, or like in my case mounts them in such a way that a significant portion of their length is "damped"... say by clamping them between something(fairing and oil-cooler supports) or letting it rest solidly against something along it's length... then the horn and this bracket will not resonate correctly... ergo: "wonk"

 

It's very weird, as they seem quite sensitive to this arrangement. So what was begun as a quick job, has turned into a weekend project

 

If i were to mount them just where the stock horns were, there would be no problem, but I wanted to relocate them ...and there ya go.

 

So I'll be tinkering with them in the morning again

 

heh <_>

[docc]

So what was begun as a quick job, has turned into a weekend project

 

Ah, yes. Welcome to 'Murphy's Garage.' A sort of twilight zone place where you can drop a washer and it violates basic laws of thermodynamics by vanishing without a trace. A place where space and time are altered to an extent that your brandy new, late model Guzzi can become a restoration project.

 

Repeat after me: wrench - ride - drink

 

- -

[al_roethlisberger]

Here are some photos of the finished job. With the tank installed, the horns are just barely visible when peering straight down. Otherwise, they are very stealth.... unless of course you HONK them