Horn help please

Hi everyone i have a 1986 cabby and the horn is not working. I have taken the aftermarket steering wheel off and there is only one black wire that connects to the aftermarket steering wheel push button. There is no relay in the postition 6 of the fuse box and i think it has had an alarm fitted previously. I think the wire to the fusebox has been cut in order to remove the alarm but i cant seem to find the cut bit of the wire. My question is can i cut the black wire just before the fusebox and run another wire to the steering wheel button? then will my horn work? I know that the actual horn works as i have done the haynes manual tests. Any help would be appreciated.

Alex

Did you remove the alarm ? Then horn did not work or has it never worked ? Relay six marked 53 should be in place in the fuze box .

There is no black wire [if wired correctly] in the standard horn wiring . The steering wheel wire is brown/black and is used simply to supply and earth to the horn relay . Not sure what you have inherited

 

oh dear that sounds as if i have got some dodgy electrics going on then. Haven't looked at the back of the fuse box yet. I can't seem to find any other wires in there only the black one and another black one that has been cut.

If i wanted to rewire the horn how would i do that? starting from scratch would be good if anyone can help.

Cheers for the reply.

Alex

Oh and i didn't remove the alarm the last guy did and the horn has never worked.

Alex

Looks like you may have fun , try and wire as VW intended as per the wiring diagram in Haynes

Good luck

have a look at the steering rack, there is an earth from there to the chassis, without this horn button wont work.

fit the relay too, duel horns need it to supply enough voltage.

and as reference there is usually only 1 wire going up to the wheel like you have, which then earths itself on the steering column after the button

Thanks for the info guys. I have had another look and have seen that the wire is earthed in the drivers side footwell and then after that seems to go nowhere. I'll take some pics of what i have and see if that helps. Cheers guys.

This may help you too- from the electrical FAQ's

The Mk1 Golf Owners Club

Dan

Hi I also having probs with my horn, all works if I earth the Coper bit behind steering wheel, then horn sounds! So my problem is at the wheel somewhere, from what I can see it should earth down the steering column when horn button, but it doesn't seem to earth through it?

Someone mentioned the steering rack should be earthed, but any idea where?

Thanks

Paul

The earth us roughly at the bottom if the steering column, it attaches to the bulkhead from what I can recall.

Before you struggle with that - because it is awkward to get to, try taking you steering wheel off and setting it a couple of splines off centre and see if that helps. The copper ring wears down and doesn't make a good connection, by moving the wheel round slightly it may work - mine did about 5 years ago and still does now!

Dan

Thanks dan, will try that. Although if I take wheel off and put a wire on the copper part and try and earth it on the splines at all it doesn't sound the horn. Although if I put a wire from the copper to the metal plate infront of the stalks it sounds the horn, so it's as if the column isn't eqrthing right to me?

If this makes any sense!

There should be a brass ring on the steering wheel itself and a kind of similar copper spring contact that runs off the column. As the wheel rotates, the spring contact runs around the brass ring keeping a constant connection.

There will be other threads that will give more information, if you do a search it may cut your efforts down.

Dan

if horn doesnt sound when you earth that copper contact to the column spline, the issue is your column isnt earthed. this is what you are looking for:

Thanks, that sounds like my problem!  Will post once sorted!

thanks for the pics!  Yep that was my problem, wire was broken, and both parts needed cleaning up!  Easier said than done though as behind the exhaust and heat shields!  

Managed to get the wire orr the steering column, and then run a new earth, as couldnth get the screw out of bulk head.

But all working now though!   

Now to fix my clock next and change the heater blower!

thanks again.

Court