First, as I've said in the past, if there's a wrench involved I'll find a way to make a 20 minute job take 2 hours.

So I want a louder horn, and don't like the trumpet look. The HD premium air horn looks small and is supposed to be loud. Great, I'll get one, how hard
can it be to put on. I do own some tools and have a service manual. So I pick it up, folks on this good forum say it isn't bad to install.

Last night I pull out the directions and I'm only slightly afraid ;-) Partial tank removal, what the he11 is a butt splice (took me 10 minutes to find it in the manual).

Get the cowbell off, the old horn off, seat off, disconnect battery, loosen the tank (not doing the partial removal)
and start to put the wires in. All is going sooooo well, until I get to that darn
1" rubber part screwed into the mounting plate. Instructions say just remove it and throw it away. Yea right. The darn thing just ain't comming off, no way, no how.
I try my hand, plyers, vice grips, nothing. I look behind it with a mirror, the nut behind the mount is part of the mount that won't help. Okay, so I figure maybe the screw comming out of the rubber has a hex head burried in it. I start cutting and pulling the rubber off, guess what, no hex head. I then decide to take the mount itself off. I get the two scrws off on the engine heads, can only get 1/8 of a turn on the middle one (from each side). Get it almost off and the nut is now turning the screw itself and there's no way for me to reach the nut on the other end. Oh, did I mention by this point it had been two hours? So I give up, tape the dangling wires for the horn to the mount (after I put the mount back on 1/8" turns and all, three hours in total time, and I complete ripped out my old horn, that's it).
This morning I Call my dealer and ask if they can possibly get me in to install this thing. Luckilly they can take me at 3:00pm. The let me watch them work.

Two and sometime three mechanics later, from 3:15 - 6:20 the job is done.

First mechanic (looks like a new younger guy) reads the direcions and says. This doesn't look too bad. Removes my tape job and see's what's left of the rubber. He's obviously stumpped. I tell him what I did and why I'm there having them do it. He proceeds to use a knife to remove the rest of the rubber to see what he can do. Tries all kinds of things, no luck. Get's the second mechanic, he decides anything they try might damage the bike so they have to take the mount off. They discover the nut issue on the middle mount. They do stuff to the tank and raise it much more than me, use some neat tools to get in there and finally get the mount off. The take it in the back somewher and come back 10 minutes later with the thing off. By now it's 4:30. At this point another mechanic wonders over and says. Those things either come right off or they don't come off at all. At this point, the rest of the install goes rather smoothly, maybe an hour to route the wires, tie them down, scrub batter terminals, crimp oh I mean butt splice wires and melt the plastic shrink wrap, clean the mess etc... put the tank/seat etc... on and wipe the bike down. To be honest, they really seemed to be taking their time. Probably because I was watching and it's also the first time ever that the place didn't have a bike on all 5 work stations.

They only charged me an hours labor in the end so I can't complain, he11 I'm happy about it. Between the two guys that did most of the work I say they actually spent a full three hours between them working in the 3 hours I was there. And I don't feel so bad with my attempts at this "simple" horn repalcement job either ;-)

The horn is loud as heck!

Okay, you can all stop lauging now.

 

I paid to get mine installed when I bought my bike. I could not believe that it took him almost two hours. My rivco horns on my road king were not that bad to get on. But I like the factory look. I wish it was a little louder.
Jeff

 

After $200+ and less than an hour for the install I replace the HD Premium Air Horn with a Rivco that I can really hear. The HD Premium Air Horn is the poorest sounding Air Horn I ever heard and certain anything but loud. It rests in my scrap bin as I would be embarrassed to sell it on ebay. How can MOCO sell this crap?

I can’t tell you how my wrencher installed it but it did not take a long time. He said the OEM was already wired with a relay. The new harness was for older models. Maybe that caused the lousy sound but I doubt it. My Rivco’s are 50 times louder and cost less!

 

haa great story. I too installed the horn. it took me 2 hrs to get that stupid rubber thing off from engine mount. I called a dealer and he said some time the locktite used keeps it from coming out and to use heat on the bolt to loosen it up. I wasnt to happy about that since fuel line was right there. I had already destroyed the rubber and just had the one scew left to get out. The heat made the diff. I put the vice grips on it and it backed right out.

after mounting the horn I wasnt sure if I liked the look. backed away from it then looked some more. still wasnt sure after working 2 hrs if I still liked it. I decided to temp wire it up and test it before i went any further. The sound sucked. one tone and not nearly as loud as a 40 dollar horn I installed on my metric bike. I was very angry since when I bought it the dealer said this is the lodest horn you will ever hear its very loud. I asked what was the sound rating so I could compair with the other horn which was 139db. couldnt find anything. I should have had a clue when I was at the dealer and they were going to test it but couldnt get it to sound. they said take it home if you dont like it bring it back. I thought that was a great Idea..so I bring it back and explain wasnt loud enough then the clerk says ok but I can only give you store credit not your money back..wasnt to happy bout that since this thing was over 200 bucks, so the clerk neeeds an over ride to process the return. The owner starts to do the over ride and says you cant return this it is an electrical item. I want to exploed but I kep my cool and said your employee said I could return it if it wasnt loud enough..the owner goes on to tell me at the dealer show how loud these horns were and maybe something was wrong with it..anyway they returned it and got a store credit..bought a $40 horn instaled in no time very loud. [Stebel Nautilus Compact Motorcycle Air Horn - Loud (SNH-01) = $34.95[/b][/b]

 

Great story !!

 

zubaugh,

I had plans to order a HD Premium Air Horn today, but your post gave me second thoughts. What was wrong with the HD horn? Are all of the Rivco's components waterproof? I want loud, but it has to be a quality horn which will last rain or shine.

Thanks for the posts on this topic! Just yesterday I had two idiots within a mile of each other pull RIGHT out in front of me and then drive 15 mph less than the speed limit. Both should have their phones shoved up their &%%. I wish they would make it illegal to "talk & drive", but until they do I need a louder horn...

Edmo

 

I installed my HD air horn in about 20 minutes and it's loud. Much louder than the Howard's I put on, took off and put on my boat. There must be a wiring issue with your horns. Mine are loud.

 

I don't know guys, but the HD Premium Air horn on my bike is freaking loud. It sounds like a train horn. I blasted it last night in the garage, doors closed, familly upstairs. Dog went nuts, everyone was like 'what the he11 was that??? I was under the impression that the HD Prem. Air Horn was the Stebel horn. Just chromed, HD logo, mouting kit and of course a lot more money.

I looked at both the Stebel on-line and the Premium Horn and they are virutally identical.

Joe

 

Check out these guys. They were at the Nat'l HOG Rally in Billings. Good sounding horn . http://www.bjspecialties.com/

 

Oh yeah $175.