Fiamm Horn Mod.

[ctr46]

Fiamm's web sight says current draw in amps is 5.
My multi meter says the stock horn draws 2.5 amps.
Tomorrow I'll edit this and let you know what the current draw of the freeway blaster is on my FZ6.

http://www.fiammamerica.com/media/documents/HornCatalog2004.pdf

Fiamm freeway blaster that I installed draws 4.03 amps.

Does that mean it is necessary to install a relay or not??

 

[jimcisme]

Good question

The service manual says 3 amps max and I think they are referring to the horn, not the switch. But then again it’s on a 10 amp fuse. And I could not find anything that says what the switch is rated at.

I wired up a similar horn on my FZ6 (STEBEL Nautalus) and you WILL need to use a relay. Simply put, you will burn out your horn switch contacts if you don't use one. I've had mine on for about a year with no problems other than having to replace the relay once as I had it badly positioned and water got into it.

This horn (STEBEL Nautalus) draws 18 amps at 12 volts. (From STEBEL's web sight.) For sure it would need a relay.

For the Fiamm horn?
Its a stock replacement horn. As I understand it, you will need to use a relay if you run two horns but with just one its fine.

I am not saying that it could not happen, just that in my experince, it does not cause a problem.

I do know that the ninja250 board has been around for a very long time, the Fiamm freeway blaster has been a recomended mod for a long time, no relay is called out, and no failure of the horn switches have been related to the swap that I know of.

If the thread was reccomending installing two horns or a higher amp draw horn, I believe a relay would be a good idea, for just installing the Fiamm I can find no evidence that a relay is needed.

Wrightme43 seams to be of the opinion that it won’t be a problem, and I'm inclined to agree with him. Enough that I 'm going to take the relay I bough back. But hey, I’m not an electrician. (I'm a machinist who got to work for Honda just long enough to go to Honda school, 25 years ago.) I just don't think 1 amp over what the service manual says is max for the stock horn will kill my switch.

 

[mikebike]

no relay & no problems with my switch as of yet

 

[ctr46]

no relay & no problems with my switch as of yet

How long have you had it installed?

 

[wrightme43]

Mines been on for 12500 miles with no problems. Plus 8000 miles on my ninja with no problems. Thats all I know.

 

[ctr46]

Mines been on for 12500 miles with no problems. Plus 8000 miles on my ninja with no problems. Thats all I know.

Ok, that's it... I'll order myself one.. Without the relay... If the switch stops working I guess I'll just have to fix that somehow

Thanks for the reply guys!!

Btw. where is the best price for the Fiamm lowtone horn delivered to Norway??

 

[wrightme43]

LOL man I sure dont know that answer to that one. LOL

www.aerostitch.com has them for sale, but shipping.. Who knows.

 

[mikebike]

How long have you had it installed?

Since mid sept about 1,800 miles

 

[ctr46]

LOL man I sure dont know that answer to that one. LOL

www.aerostitch.com has them for sale, but shipping.. Who knows.

Hehe and I thought you were the man with the answers

I'll check it out!

Thanks

Hmm I checked out aerostitch and they require $40 in shipping

Anyone else know of a website that has cheaper international shipping??

EDIT: I received a package from them today after ordering a LED brake light and some other stuff... shipping was $ 25 and very fast delivery, so I guess I'll order some more when I can afford it

 

[cv_rider]

Here it is installed. It broke though, and I have to get another one. LOL

I'm about to install one of the Fiamm Fwy Blasters. wrightme, as your picture shows, you have it pointing straight up. Aside from the water issue, that doesn't really seem like the ideal position. It would seem to direct the sound inside the fairing. I would think you'd want it pointing forward as much as possible.

Has anyone mounted this in any other way? I think I could mount it facing forwards by lying on its side instead of vertically as WM's is, without much difficultly. If I bent the bracket it came with 90 degrees, I might be able to mount it facing forwards and and vertically. Which I do may depend on if any of the configurations end up causing it to get in the way of the lower edge of the fairing when turning the forks (and needing to keep in mind if it hit the fairing while the forks are turned AND compressed, which would be a situation that would be hard to try out in the garage).

This thread is 1.5 years old. Has anyone who directly wired it to the horn relay switch yet had a failure with it? None had been reported any problems with that when this thread went to the grave, but now that it has risen, I'd like to hear some comments on that.

 

[shamrocker]

I mounted mine in the same position as stock, with the horn facing to the right. I've only had it installed for a month, but so far, so good.

 

[wrightme43]

Well I guess I should update this one.

I am on my 5th yes 5th freeway blaster horn now. Make sure you buy it local and give them a phone number for the warrenty

 

[Boneman]

Well I guess I should update this one.

I am on my 5th yes 5th freeway blaster horn now. Make sure you buy it local and give them a phone number for the warrenty

Buy A STEBEL?!?!

 

[SovietRobot]

While reading this thread, I was thinking about how cool it would be to wire up a Fiamm horn to the stock location/wiring, AND my stebel horn wired through relay/tapped into stock wiring for activation.

 

[Boneman]

While reading this thread, I was thinking about how cool it would be to wire up a Fiamm horn to the stock location/wiring, AND my stebel horn wired through relay/tapped into stock wiring for activation.

Now THAT would be a horn of all horns!!! :thumbup:

 

[SirIsaac]

I'm about to install one of the Fiamm Fwy Blasters. wrightme, as your picture shows, you have it pointing straight up. Aside from the water issue, that doesn't really seem like the ideal position. It would seem to direct the sound inside the fairing. I would think you'd want it pointing forward as much as possible.

Has anyone mounted this in any other way?

In a word, yes.

In many words:
This thread inspired me to try the Fiamm Freeway blaster. I have known since I got my FZ6 that the stock horn is pretty weak. I read many posts here about its weakness and the upgrade alternatives. The consensus seemed to be that the best (i.e. loudest) option would be the Stebel Nautilus. I kept meaning to get one, but while it is certainly a doable mod, it does have some complicating factors. As a result of the perceived complications, I kept on putting it off, which left me with a wimpy roadrunner-esque "meep-meep" horn. The impression I got was that while not as loud as the Stebel, the Fiamm Freeway Blaster is still much better than the stock horn and can be powered directly from the existing wires, so I decided to give it a try. Easiest option for purchase was to just go to Amazon.com and order one. It was only about $15 and I got free super saver shipping since with other stuff the total order was over $25, and a couple of days later it arrived at my door. The installation process took a little thinking and a few trips between garage and basement for cutting and adjusting, but was actually pretty easy. Here’s the process I used, boiled down to the essentials:
1. Remove the 10 mm bolt holding the stock horn to the bike, unplug the wires and remove from bike.
2. Remove the bracket from the stock horn and hold it on the bracket that came with the Fiamm, with the bracket-to-horn mounting holes aligned. Then mark the locations of the bracket-to-bike mounting hole and the small slot in the stock bracket onto the Fiamm bracket.
3. Drill two holes in the Fiamm bracket (one to be the mounting hole, the other to be the slot) and cut it down with a hack saw.
4. Bend the Fiamm bracket to angle the horn downward. This bend combined with the angle of the mounting location on the bike caused the Fiamm to be basically level and “fire” forward from just below the bottom of the fairing. I don’t know the exact angle, maybe 30 degrees, but the bracket needs to be bent such that you can just barely get the 10 mm mounting bolt through the new bracket with the bracket mounted on the horn.
5. To get the stock wires to reach, I had to bend the connector tabs on the horn at more of a right angle to the horn, and cut off one of the two tie wraps that held the stock wires to the fork tube to free up a little slack.

Conclusion– The Fiamm is a HUGE improvement over the stock horn. It is louder, and has a much deeper, more authoritative tone. Even if you think you will someday do the Stebel, if you are not doing it right now, my advice would be to get the Fiamm Freeway blaster and install it as described above. It is cheap enough to buy and easy enough to install that you can consider it a throwaway.

The attached pictures below show how I cut and bent the bracket, with a couple of photos of how it looks on the bike.

 

[heath_AU]

Hi All

Has been a while since i was involved in the 'horn upgrade' discussion/s

Well ages ago i decided that i needed to upgrade the mediocre stock unit on my FZ6 so i got a Stebel Nautilus as it sounded amazing. Of course when it showed up it was clear that this was FAR too big/bulky to mount anywhere on my naked FZ6N so i now have one still in its box if anyone would like it.
Paid around $60 AUD for it but will sell it for $40AUD (+postage from Aust) if anyone is keen.

Anyway - has anyone installed this Fiamm freeway blaster on a FZ6N (or any naked bike using the universal metal tab slip on mount?)

Mine is mounted on the left side of the frame just above the radiator.

Cheers.

H

 

[agf]

Hey I'll take it
whats the postage to Melbourne I can paypal or transfer direct to you r bank account

I have one already but I would love to put one on my sons bike
cheers

 

[ltdillard]

Old thread, but I think this is a good place to provide my 2 cents on this inexpensive upgrade. Post #36 above is a great write-up of the procedure.

However, I evidently cut too much off the supplied bracket. Thus, after installing and getting everything tightened down the new horn sounded extremely muffled. I had material to make essentially a new bracket and with the stock-sized bracket it works great. So, if you follow those directions from post #36 don't cut too much. I'm not sure what the max is that you can cut off safely. I had basically cut it in half, as I wanted to keep the horn as close in as possible. Evidently the horn likes some wiggle/vibration in the bracket, so with my shorter bracket it prohibited proper operation of the horn.

Now you know
Tom