horn question

[tenn.jerry]

my truck has a gm altinator. its 12 volt and i am going to put on my horn.i have been searching the treads but not having any luck. will my horn work on the 12 volts? its a horn i got off of a 51 truck . ihooked it to the battery and it sounded off really loud but i keep reading about relays my manual dont show a relay it shows a wire from the regulator to the horn since i dont have a regulator whats the best way to hook it up? any help would sure be appreciated.

[greg g]

on the stock set up the relay is powered from an ign on source, So system is basically hot and the horn button provides the ground for the relay which then powers the grounded horn from the battery through the relay.

you can power the relay from the ign side of the coil if the rest of the circuit is intact.

the relay probably should be changed to a 12 V, but the horns probably won't care abouth the voltage as long as you don't lay on it or use it as a wedding car....

[MBF]

Jerry-when I converted by 36 Plymouth to 12 volts I left the 6 volt horn as it was. No problems so far and that was 5 yrs ago. I even liked the pilot house horn sound enough to put one in my 78 Dodge half ton-same deal-no problem. Mike

[4852dodge]

I converted my truck to 12v 20 years ago and have been using the 6v horn with no problem. Neither of my trucks have relays, this is the way they were and I didn't change it. One truck is a driver the other is parts.

[Merle Coggins]

The trucks only used one horn as standard and didn't use a relay. They were powered hot all the time. If you had dual horns then a relay was needed. Since you no longer use, or have, a voltage regulator on the firewall you could bring your power wire right from the starter. When I rewired my truck I added an inline fuse between the connection at the regulator and my horns for added safety.

Merle

[lugnut123]

Can you rrrebuild a horn?Sorry about the studdder.