Horn not working on '60 Electra...

[JanZverina]

Anyone have any ideas how to get the horns working on my '60 Electra 4719? Horns themselves work - they are mounted in place and I hot-wired them to the battery. Horn relay changed to no avail. I unscrewed the horn push assembly on the steering wheel and checked/cleaned the contacts and checked wiring. Brown wire is connected to the stick-up terminal at bottom of steering column. Other than trying to clean the contacts inside the plug-in connector of the light blue/brown wires at the relay, I am running out of ideas. There does not appear to be a separate fuse for the horn in the fuse panel or anywhere else. Is that right? Any ideas appreciated!

[Guest brh]

If your 60 is like my 65 Skylark there is a relay mounted on your inner fender, driver's side, little rectangular thing with a metal top. Pull the plug and check your contacts. My horn would quit did not find what the problem was. Knowing the car was gonna be judged and that the horn must work, I kept working on it. Finally gave up, shut the hood and washed the car. Just for the hell of it, hit the horn--it worked. Only thing I could figure was water got someplace and made a contact, raised the hood, saw this little relay pulled the plug to find really dirty contacts. Worked ever since.

[JanZverina]

Thanks. I cleaned all contacts and grounds and still nothing. So I ran an external wire from the wires from the horn buttons under the center emblem cap on the steering wheel, OUTSIDE the column to the wire that connects to the pin contact at the very bottom of the steering column, just below the neutral safety switch - and the horns worked! So I guess the fault must be in that wire that runs through the center shaft of the column, Anyone know how to get to that one???

[JoelsBuicks]

Upon doing this jumpering, did the horn buttons make the horn sound or did they honk when you touched the connections? Do you know if this system is based on the ground wire making contact with ground to activate the horn? I've not had my 60 apart but I once had an old ford that was this way.

[JanZverina]

The horn buttons had to be pressed to get the horn to work. That's why I suspect it's the horn wire that runs through the steering column shaft. But I am not sure where it starts on the low (firewall) end of the column. There's a brass spring-loaded pin or teminal there. (The wire attached to that is what I disconnected from that pin. I put the jumper wire into the female plug of that detached wire to get the horns to work when I pressed the buttons.) I removed the pin terminal - it is attached to column with two small hex screws and has a contact that rides the steering shaft inside the column, but I still cannot see where the horn wire begins inside the column.

[Caballero2]

The spring loaded pin terminal runs against a slip ring. the wire that runs from the end of the shaft at the horn button is soldered to that slip ring which is insulated from the shaft. if that wire is broken or is separated from the slip ring, then the problem you describe will occur.

Dan

'57 Roadmaster

'57 Super

'63 Lesabre

[JanZverina]

Thanks, Dan. Does the entire column have to come out to get to that soldered connection?

[Caballero2]

I have never tried that in the car. I suppose it could be done by dropping the column from the dash, removing the steering wheel, the turn signal mechanism, disconnecting the wiring harness and pulling the outer sleeve from over the shaft. This would expose the entire shaft and allow you to thread a new wire through or repair the old. Dan