flippin horn again grrrr

just when i thought it was over it ain't.
drove my car monday after what i thought was problem solved, only to find that yesterday and today the horn is worse then ever. back to square 1 i guess. any suggestions folks. i am going to have to look for a short some where, i did notice that the rubber cap covering the leads to the horn where not on properly i wonder if water has got into them and this is causing the horns to sound? although i can hear the relay clicking on and off. will have a look at the fuze board to see if there is a loose wire. i know if you don't clear the drain holes out water can overflow back into the car and down to the fuse box, but mine is dry, so it could be the relay it's self. if not then iwill have to trace the wires back from the horn ring back to the fuze box, will i have to remove the whole dash to get to the loom?

help guys. :cry:

Check you have an earth though the steering column via the contact on the column switches. There is an earth wire at the steering box to the body that often rusts.

cheers mate,
 where abouts will the column earth wire be situated? and where does it attatch to, i really am clueless. ops:

at the bottom of the colomn where it joins the rack in the engine bay

Twin horns ? GTi model ? If you can hear the relay clicking and still have no horn , disconnect one of the horns , leaving just one . Try again , power drop on old wiring is sufficient  to leave little power to power both . Common on older cars .

Problem solved ? Fit a relay near the horns if you want 2 working or run just one . If you only have one horn try changing that .



  

well found the earth wire for the column and checked it its solidly attatched, no corrosion etc, checked continuity with multi meter and that shows fine even when i wiggle the wire. i have replaced the stalk with the tab that fits against the horn ring contact on the wheel. still no joy. the horns still go off when they want to. although the wheel is a vw, i don't think its the original one, so might look out for one. my next step is to look at the wiring under the column shroud. when looking the other day when getting the clocks out to replace the L.C.D. display i did notice some wires taped up together so may be thats where the problem lies. thing is the horns still operate when i push the horn centre button as normal. Grrrrrrrrrrrrrrr!

Oooh, you're out of my league here I'm afraid!  :dontknow:

Can't help beyond the dodgy contact ring suggestion!

Hope you get it sorted soon! I only had my problem for an afternoon. Got a mate to disconnect the horn for me and drove like that till hubby fixed it.

Mind you, I was alarmed to find that i still had the horn working when I pressed it without thinking. The mate didn't realise that GTIs have two horns and only disconnected one. Luckily it was the one causing the problem - how come it wasn't both though????  :dontknow:

good suggestion there, diconnect horn at the wheel, protect with some insulation tape. Then see if you get the horn coming on still, intermittantly as before.

if you do you are tracing a short, if you dont then the steering wheel is the right place to look for the problem.

cheers folks,
i have now looked at the gap between the wheel and the stalks column contact where the 2 meet each other the gap between them is slightly lower. with the wheel centered,it really compresses the horn column tab down flat. is there any way of spacing the wheel to make the gap slightly wider? to take the pressure off. i think that my column may be bent, this happened before i got the car. looks like it had been stolen before. what happens is the thieves pull down really hard on the wheel and force the steering lock twisting the wheel at the same time, bending the column, so when you turn the wheel it turns concentric.so the gap between the horn contact ring and the stalk base alters when the wheel is turned. i am wondering if this is the problem! will disconnect the horn centre to see if that helps as suggested.
will keep you posted.

Is your problem the horn doesn't work or occasionally sounds without you pressing the push. I've had two problems recently, the earth wire at the horn had broken away from the terminal but the insulation was still intact so it looked okay and the plug and socket at the rear of the relay plate had a bad connection. Just for info the horn has a permanent +ve, yellow and black, and the relay switches the -ve, brown.

cheers Cedar,
that's my next job to check wheel connections. the problem is the horn works fine and most of the time doesn't go off, but it's like the thing is haunted it does go off on it's own accord without me pressing the horn centre. like Debs said people look at you gone out. Am going to trace the earth wire through the wheel to the rack to make sure there is continuity, like i have said the earth from the column to the rack is ok i have put the multi meter through it and there is good connection, thats where crocodile clips and extra wire comes in handy. i wiggled the wire to see if the connection was intermittent, but it was ok.

had a good look at the fuse box end, i couldn't see any loose plugs etc and i removed the relay to check it, it seems fine and is a snug fit in it's holder.
problem is it's difficult to see what you are doing up side down in the foot well. especially with a broken jaw that's been wired up, at least my Doris can get some peace and quiet.

i also thought about the wheel being slightly off, could this be the column bearings, as i read somewhere that the bearing housing is plastic. Any one care to enlighten me?
 cheers folks

Try pulling the relay out and see if that cures it, if it doesn't the fault must be between the relay and the horn, if it does the fault must be between the horn push and the relay. I would guess the fault is either with the relay or in the brown wire between the relay and the horn. You can spend more time trying to fix something like this than it takes to rebuild an engine.

well folks i believe i have cracked it.
thanks to all who contributed.
Started off removing the horn centre, but the horn still went off, next took the wheel off and checked the wires from the wheel, they checked out ok.
so removed the steering column shrouds, as i knew from before the wiring under had some black tape around it. un peeled the tape to see that someone has at some point spliced wiring into the wires that go to the indicator stalks etc, probably for an alarm. i cut out the bad sections and re crimmped all the wires.Someone told me not to solder the wire as the flux contained in the solder attacks the insulation, due to it being acidic? bugger me after all that  it still went off.GRRRRRRRRRRRRR!
back to square one.
your right cedar you could build an engine in the time it taken me to sort this out.
well sat there, car in bits, a tear in my eye and a cup of tea, why is tea great, you know "sit down love have a cup of tea and a fag, got some bad news for you, your telly's f……d" funny how i remember the tv repair man breaking the good news to my mum, when i was a kid.
Sorry folks got lost there, so sat there staring, then it hit me, i noticed that the tab that rubs against the horn ring was being pushed down and it was just barely shorting on the bottom screw that holds the indicator/wiper assemblies in place. i had noticed that the screw kept going round and the thread was stripped, so simply removed the screw and placed some insulating tape over the black plastic holder the tab is joined to, covering the metal underneath, then placed a piece of tiny "O ring" rubber under the tab, to help stop it being compressed to much, re assembled every thing and so far so good.

mmmm wonder whats next?

cheers Guy's and Gal's    :mrgreen:

The oil pressure warning buzzer I expect, hope you've fixed the horn. Cedar.

yep it's fixed been out turning left, right all over the show.Not a single beep, unless i press the horn center.

chortle said

well folks i believe i have cracked it.
thanks to all who contributed.
Started off removing the horn centre, but the horn still went off, next took the wheel off and checked the wires from the wheel, they checked out ok.
so removed the steering column shrouds, as i knew from before the wiring under had some black tape around it. un peeled the tape to see that someone has at some point spliced wiring into the wires that go to the indicator stalks etc, probably for an alarm. i cut out the bad sections and re crimmped all the wires.Someone told me not to solder the wire as the flux contained in the solder attacks the insulation, due to it being acidic? bugger me after all that  it still went off.GRRRRRRRRRRRRR!
back to square one.
your right cedar you could build an engine in the time it taken me to sort this out.
well sat there, car in bits, a tear in my eye and a cup of tea, why is tea great, you know "sit down love have a cup of tea and a fag, got some bad news for you, your telly's f……d" funny how i remember the tv repair man breaking the good news to my mum, when i was a kid.
Sorry folks got lost there, so sat there staring, then it hit me, i noticed that the tab that rubs against the horn ring was being pushed down and it was just barely shorting on the bottom screw that holds the indicator/wiper assemblies in place. i had noticed that the screw kept going round and the thread was stripped, so simply removed the screw and placed some insulating tape over the black plastic holder the tab is joined to, covering the metal underneath, then placed a piece of tiny "O ring" rubber under the tab, to help stop it being compressed to much, re assembled every thing and so far so good.

mmmm wonder whats next?

cheers Guy's and Gal's    :mrgreen:

Just found this post via the search function. THIS IS GOLD    It should be in the FAQ.

My horn has been driving me mad going on at random. Checked all wires, but couldn't find the problem. Read the above, ran to the car and checked. That was spot on the problem   

Thanks to 'chortle' for providing the solution  :notworthy:

chortle said

cheers folks,
i have now looked at the gap between the wheel and the stalks column contact where the 2 meet each other the gap between them is slightly lower. with the wheel centered,it really compresses the horn column tab down flat. is there any way of spacing the wheel to make the gap slightly wider? to take the pressure off. i think that my column may be bent, this happened before i got the car. looks like it had been stolen before. what happens is the thieves pull down really hard on the wheel and force the steering lock twisting the wheel at the same time, bending the column, so when you turn the wheel it turns concentric.so the gap between the horn contact ring and the stalk base alters when the wheel is turned. i am wondering if this is the problem! will disconnect the horn centre to see if that helps as suggested.
will keep you posted.

You might have a piece of the steering lock jammed somewhere. Remove the wheel and steering lock parts and re-assemble it sorted mine out.

pallec said

chortle said

well folks i believe i have cracked it.
thanks to all who contributed.
Started off removing the horn centre, but the horn still went off, next took the wheel off and checked the wires from the wheel, they checked out ok.
so removed the steering column shrouds, as i knew from before the wiring under had some black tape around it. un peeled the tape to see that someone has at some point spliced wiring into the wires that go to the indicator stalks etc, probably for an alarm. i cut out the bad sections and re crimmped all the wires.Someone told me not to solder the wire as the flux contained in the solder attacks the insulation, due to it being acidic? bugger me after all that  it still went off.GRRRRRRRRRRRRR!
back to square one.
your right cedar you could build an engine in the time it taken me to sort this out.
well sat there, car in bits, a tear in my eye and a cup of tea, why is tea great, you know "sit down love have a cup of tea and a fag, got some bad news for you, your telly's f……d" funny how i remember the tv repair man breaking the good news to my mum, when i was a kid.
Sorry folks got lost there, so sat there staring, then it hit me, i noticed that the tab that rubs against the horn ring was being pushed down and it was just barely shorting on the bottom screw that holds the indicator/wiper assemblies in place. i had noticed that the screw kept going round and the thread was stripped, so simply removed the screw and placed some insulating tape over the black plastic holder the tab is joined to, covering the metal underneath, then placed a piece of tiny "O ring" rubber under the tab, to help stop it being compressed to much, re assembled every thing and so far so good.

mmmm wonder whats next?

cheers Guy's and Gal's    :mrgreen:

Just found this post via the search function. THIS IS GOLD    It should be in the FAQ.

My horn has been driving me mad going on at random. Checked all wires, but couldn't find the problem. Read the above, ran to the car and checked. That was spot on the problem   

Thanks to 'chortle' for providing the solution  :notworthy:

Cheers Bud it's nice to see that my strife has helped someone else out. Much head scratching with that one mate, but that is what this site is for any thing to help.

have done a couple of how to's as I now got a decent camera.
1) B pillar replacement (Cabriolet)

http://www.vwgolfmk1.org.uk/modules.php?name=Forums&file=viewtopic&t=48305&highlight=pillar

2) my latest attempt Seat refurb should suit both cabby and tin tops

http://www.vwgolfmk1.org.uk/modules.php?name=Forums&file=viewtopic&t=59405&highlight=seat+refurb

hope these help.

Btw solder is better, flux IS acidic but you dont leave the flux on when your done soldering you wash it off with whatever solvent you have to hand, isopropynol is the best and you can get a large bottle from boots.

We used to use Trichloryethene but I think its banned now

Madferret said

Btw solder is better, flux IS acidic but you dont leave the flux on when your done soldering you wash it off with whatever solvent you have to hand, isopropynol is the best and you can get a large bottle from boots.

We used to use Trichloryethene but I think its banned now

cheers for that madferret,

I alway's wipe down flux from soldering. Best practice for plumbing too.
But as the flux is in the solder all ready, I was told that the heat from the Iron swells the plastic sleeving and the flux runs under the opened plastic.
I did think that the small amount of residue would be negligble.
Is that correct??
It's hard to know what's correct as people have differing Ideas etc.