Horn Rod Repair Kit

[Franchise_24]

Anyone used the horn rod repair kits? Comes with the wire, contacts, and insulators. My horn is not making a ground it appears so I was going this route to try to repair it. Any advice from anyone who has done it? Thanks!

[Mark W.]

I had a lot more problems than a bad ground, the tube was cracked in 3 places to a point where it was not turning the switch, so I machined some keystock to fit into modern brake line and silver-soldered up a new tube that would bolt to my original handle.

The wire was the easy part - I soldered a brass brake rivet to the wire and insulated it with heat-shrink - the plastic screw was drilled and used to hold-off the rivet at the right distance to make the contact in the switch - at the top the screw holds the handle to the tube and I cut the wire insulation flush to it and used the screw to grab & hold the wire as a top contact - the gob of solder was needed to make the wire ends easy to file off smooth.

Not pretty, but you can't see it and my car still looks original whereas the new switch would have stuck out like a sore thumb on the car I have.

[Franchise_24]

Thanks for the info Mark. Luckily my light switch rod works and turns on the lights/parking lights, but we think it is an issue down at the base of the rod. Weather permitting I hope to look at it on Saturday and I will let you guys know what I find out.

[Mark W.]

I think you could still re-wire it without the kit if you take a close look at what is there and think on it some.

[Tom Wesenberg]

Originally Posted by Mark W.

I think you could still re-wire it without the kit if you take a close look at what is there and think on it some.

I agree and before looking for a bad horn rod wire, I'd first look for a poor contact where the horn button toughes ground when pushed. This is often a poor connection from little use. Start by grounding right at the horn, then at the center contact in the light switch, then at the horn button. This is going from the easiest ground to check, to the hardest ground to check. Some people in the past have also reported that their steering column needed to be better grounded, so you could also use a jumper wire to ground the column before going to the harder ground checks.

[1crosscut]

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I just used one of the kits from the vendors. The instructions that come with the kit are pretty amaturish. Found this same instruction quality issue with a visor cover and seat cover instructions. Can't quite figure out why it is so hard to make a nice set of instructions for something you sell lots of but..... I digress. Back to installing a kit.
I had trouble with my horn sounding. I put a volt meter on it and checked for continuity and it checked out fine. Wiring loom fine connections good horn good etc... but still had intemittent horn operation. Got a kit and pulled the wire out of the horn rod. It looked good but after giving a few tugs on the wire at the top connection for the horn button the wire came out of the contact. Apparently the solder failed or never was used on this one in the first place. Once I got the kit in the horn works great. Do be careful not to use too much heat when soldering the lower connection as it will melt pretty easy.
Dave

[Franchise_24]

Thanks for the info Dave, appreciate it.

Neal

[Bruce in southern OH]

Kit worked fine, only problem is that 3 of the 4 tabs on back of the button broke off when I went to re-assemble the horn rod, now I can not just buy the button, have to purchase a whole horn button kit.