Hi,
My father-in-law has a dodge ram 3500 turbo diesel and his only real complaint about the truck is that the horn is kind of wimpy. I've heard good things about about the hella brand for horns, but no personal experience. Can anyone throw out a suggestion for a good upgrade? He doesn't want to cause hearing damage, just get people's attention if he gets cut off or squeezed on the road.

http://www.rallylights.com/hella/horns.asp

I was thinking HL85104 or HL85115?

-dave

 

I replaced my originals with FIAMMs. High tone, low tone. 2 seperate horns. Just be careful though with any brand you select. Aftermarket horns can draw HUGE amounts of amperage. My 2 FIAMMs blew the factory fuse, so I had to relay them. Not a big deal.


www.fiammamerica.com

Good luck.

 

Check out www.hornblasters.com Make sure you check out the videos!!

 

For some reason I see myself going around town doing the same thing..lol. That Jesus Saves video was the best.

 

Thanks for the links guy, for some reason I'm leaning still towards hella or fiamm. I'm going to do some more surfing and try to guess what he'll like the most. The hellas aren't that expensive, so it may not be a big loss if he doesn't like the sound of them. I'm familiar w/ the relaying...just need to do some quick probes w/ the voltmeter to make sure I wire the relay correctly and some heavy gauge wire to the battery, right?. I did something similar for my fog lights on my subaru.


-dave

 

The two wires that are attached to the horn right now will power the relay coil. Usually #'s 85 & 86. Polarity makes no difference. Put a 14 gauge (15 amp max) or a 12 gauge (20 amp max) FUSED wire from the battery to # 30 on the relay. Then a 14 or 12 gauge wire from # 87 to the horn(s) positive connection. Whatever gauge wire you use for the positive, make sure the same size is used for the negative. Attach the negative to a good ground. That's it. I am assuming you are using a standard 30 amp, 5 spade Bosch type relay that a place like Autozone would sell. Plenty of relay for horns. Just make sure your horn circuit isin't already relayed. If it is, just add the horns themselves as long as the draw is less than the horn circuit max.

Good luck.

 

I put an air horn my Ram, but I did it for two reasons.

First, the stock horn sounds kinda whimpy for a Ram, but secondly and the REAL reason I finally did it is because it just seemed near impossible to honk the damn horn !! Nine out of ten times by the time I was finally able to honk the horn the reason why I wanted to do it in the first place had passed. I don't know if the air bag is in the way or what but it just seems way too difficult to honk the horn.

I didn't go with the fancy train horns that you guy's featured here only because i just don't have that kinda cash to blow on a horn. I wound up going with the air horns that you find at Pep Boys or any automotive store. I ran a seperate horn button and mounted it right in top of the steering column. Works like a dream. If you'd like to see some pics, let me know and I'll take some. I mounted the horns behind the bumper facing down. They fit like they were made to go there.

 

Thanks for the wiring diagram. I was planning on a beefy relay. Why is it a bad idea to do a relay to a relay? If the OEM horn is already relayed, I see that I can put the horn in parallel w/ the existing one.

I'm thinking about buying a pair of hellas and trying them on my subaru b/c my subaru has the same issue. I'll search around here to see if i can find a wiring diagram for the horn. I can't look at his truck until he's up here for christmas.

-dave