light switch at bottom of steering

roadster

Senior Member
I just put in new wiring harness and all work but the horn.

I get 6v on one wire and o on the other , when i press button 'nothing'

"i know horn works ok i checked that". the only thing i see is the spring in the middle of the switch does not move at all I tried pushing it down with a screw driver but no go . When i hook up horn wires to horn
there is 6v each side. I unhooked the ground wire from horn and ran a wire to ground and horn did blow. Would the spring not moving be the problem?
 
I had a similar problem. In my case the problem was caused by the manufacturer of the new wiring loom who wrapped the bundle of wires too tightly where they leave the bundled status and go their separate ways to the bakelite switch plate that is part of the wiring package. I used a razor plate to cut back a bit on the exterior wrap of the bundled wires, enough so that the spring loaded horn contact in the center could be depressed. That is what solved my similar problem where the horn contact was unable to depress.
 
thanks barnstuf
i have narrowed it down to this
when i take off the light switch body and touch a wire to the
center where the spring is and touch the other end to the end
of the horn rod and my wife presses the button the horn does blow
so now i have to find out why the horn rod is not touching the spring end
 
It may be that you have a horn rod that is too short. If you have a 28-29 there is one length for the 7 tooth column and one for the 2 tooth column. There were three different lengths in 1930 including one carried thru 1931 as the only length for that year.
 
I had the same problem where the horn rod didn't make contact with the center of the light swich. I built up the center point of the light switch with solder until it touched the bottom of he horn rod. Works very good. Hope this helps.
 
Your second sentence isn't quite clear. If I assume you mean you get 6 volts at one wire to mean the center contact, then I'd say these guys have already answered your question in that the center contact isn't springing into position to contact the end of the horn rod, or the horn rod is too short.

If you don't have 6 volts on the center contact of the switch contact plate, then the problem would probably be a wire crimpped in place without removing the insulation. All wires should be soldered, then you'd know this couldn't be the problem.

In the 80's I found a mystery electrical problem with a girl's new car that she got for her highschool graduation. After her Escort was 6 months old it would occasionally leave her dead in the road. By the time I came to the rescue it would start right up, so there was no problem to be found. After a few of these being left dead in the road problems, I finally looked at the terminal on the coil primary and found the terminal was crimpped on the wire without removing the insulation. Most of the time the wire end would touch the terminal though. I know a lot of the wiring harness for cars is now made in Mexico, but I don't know where her 1987 Escort harness was made.
 
I'm going to try TOM IV suggestion of puting a little solder on the spring end
I think this will do it.
 
You could try pushing the wires into the bail. Some times when you pull them out it moves the holder down far enough that the horn button doesn't reach. I have had this fix work.
 
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