Horn Stuck DESPERATE Topic is solved

theshewolf · Post by **theshewolf** » 14 Feb 2005, 10:30

I hit my horn the other day, and now, as long as the key is in the ignition, the horn will not go off.

I understand that I can look at the wiring by opening up the steering wheel with a T-30, but the only size I have is a T-10. Is there some way to find the actual horn under the hood and disconnect the wires so I can drive somewhere to either purchase a T-30 or take the car to a mechanic?

PLEASE help, as I can not drive down the road to a mechanic this way.

theshewold · Post by **theshewold** » 14 Feb 2005, 10:50

Nevermind...I decided to see if the manual was lying to me whn it said there was no fuse for the horn, and sure enough, it was.

Thank you, anyway.

Post by **matthew1** » 14 Feb 2005, 10:55

This might help, it's in a hard-to-find area on my 850 page:

By Terry Haywood
This is from memory: There are I think 4 horn contacts inside the steering wheel. They go thru a metal frame and are held in place and insulated by red plastic around each contact. The contacts normally sit just below a piece of metal on the back side of the airbag, so when you push on the horn it touches at least one of those contacts and blasts the horn. This makes more sense when you see it.

In my car the plastic that holds one of the contacts in place broke and allowed the metal contact to move just enough to touch the metal frame, making a permanent circuit. Apparently this is not exactly your problem, I guess in yours the contacts completely fell out or otherwise are not where they need to be to complete the circuit. Anyway, in my car because the plastic insulator had not completely disintegrated I was able to epoxy the thing back in place. That was only last December - it still works, but I don't blow the horn very much.

Since you get a pathetic millisecond honk I bet at least one of your contacts is in good enough shape to glue back in. If on the other hand the plastic insulation is gone you have to decide how much fabricating you want to do to fix it.

If you want to take a stab at it here are the details (again from memory)
- disconnect the battery
- turn the wheel all the way to one side. There is a hole on the back of the wheel, inside there is a t-30 torx screw. Remove that.
- turn all the way to the other side. Remove torx screw.
- airbag is now loose. Unhook electrical connector and put airbag in a safe place. (I put mine on the kitchen counter while I worked. When I went back inside my 16 year old son was juggling the airbag. Really.)
- look for broken red plastic parts. I think they are on the back side of the frame, kind of hard to see.

If you do try to fix it I would test the connections with an ohmmeter before reassembling. If fact, before I started the job I poked around for a while with an ohmmeter figuring out how the whole thing works. Maybe it'll be obvious to you.

Standard disclaimer about airbags and such - you have to remove the airbag to do this job, it's up to you to decide whether you want to mess with that. I am not an expert at this stuff. The contributors who know more than I do say you shouldn't put an ohmmeter across the airbag contacts. And finally my own tidbit - don't let your torx bit roll down the steering column, you'll never find it.

And remember to have your radio code handy when you reattach the battery or you're in for a trip to the dealer.

Guest · Post by **Guest** » 19 Feb 2005, 23:56

You will most likely need a new steering wheel. Volvo doesn't offer any replacement parts for the horn in the steering wheel.

egdeaile · Post by **egdeaile** » 23 Feb 2005, 15:58

I merely unclipped the electrical connections to the horns themselves. Cheap, I know, but it will work for now. I am going to rip the whole thing apart tomorrow. let me know how yours turns out.

egdeaile · Post by **egdeaile** » 25 Feb 2005, 00:20

Hey just finished fixing my horns. Sure enough all the red things were disintigrated. I pulled the wire totally out of the wheel, pulled the remaining red off them, covered them with vulcanizing rubber then put them back in. I pushed them through the original holes and used very thin strips of vulcanizing rubber and wrapped it tight under the head, thus securing each of the four conactors. Put it all back together and it works great!
Vulcanizing rubber is a roll of rubber tape that is very stretchy that sticks to itself. Sometimes called rubber tape or electricians tape, it is very good (better than standard electrical tape) for insulating any solder joints or electrical connections you make. It is very cheap and will certainly cost you less than a new or used steering wheel.
If you need more info on that ask and I'll get back to you.