92 camry horn issue

[oldtruckluvr]

i have a 92 camry and i am trying to figure out why my horn doesnt work. if i push it, it makes a clicking sound and every once in awhile it honks for a split second intermittently. i got new horns and the problem still exists. any idea what could cause this? thanks

[BMR]

There's a horn relay in the fusebox under the hood; the bigger fusebox nearest the battery. Maybe that's the problem?

[oldtruckluvr]

Originally Posted by BMR

There's a horn relay in the fusebox under the hood; the bigger fusebox nearest the battery. Maybe that's the problem?

i checked the voltage going to the horn and found that it was only at about 1.5v. shouldnt it be more? could that mean it is the relay? thanks!

[BMR]

It should be around 12 to 14V, depending on if the engine's running or not. So yeah, it's either a bad relay, or it's got some corroded wiring or a poor connection somewhere in the circuit.

Try just pulling and reseating the relay first. If that doesn't fix it, I'd guess a relay is cheap, so I'd be inclined to just throw a new one at it and see if that fixes it. But I'm lazy, especially when it comes to tracking down wiring problems.

Oh, one way to verify it's a bad relay would be to remove it, and jumper the appropriate terminals... horn tooting = bad relay. If ya need help figuring out which terminals, lemme know.

[oldtruckluvr]

I pulled the relay and connected a wire from the relay to the other terminal for the relay. Still nothing but a click. The relay was getting 12.5 v of power to it. So could that still mean its a bad relay? Thanks!

[BMR]

There are three terminals connected to the relay. To make the horns toot, you need to jumper the two terminals boxed in red in the pic below. Which two did you jumper?

[oldtruckluvr]

I jumped the two you said. Still with clicking. The one side was getting 12.5 volts. Not sure what to check after that. Are there 2 horns? I found one on passenger side in grille. Any ideas would be great. Thanks again!

[BMR]

OK, good. So the relay's not the problem.There must be something wrong with the horn circuit going from the fusebox to the horn. The stock setup has just one horn, BTW. Try hooking up your voltmeter to the wire at the horn, and then install the jumper again. Do you get 12V at the horn?

Edit: I just reread your postings, and you've already done this check, but with the relay in place. So the problem must be in the circuit. Follow the wire from the horn back to the fusebox, looking for bulges (indicating corrosion), frayed spots, worn thru insulation, anything abnormal.

Another way to verify that it's the wiring would be to temporarily run a new wire from the terminal with 12V to the horn. If that works, you know the problem's in the wiring.

Oh, and check that the horn is grounded to the chassis. There's only one wire going to the horn, so the return path for the electricity is the horn mounting bracket itself.

[oldtruckluvr]

Well, I think its fixed. I pulled out relay a few times, cleaned terminals also. Then I took horn bracket out and cleaned up the rust on it. Seems to work now. Im thinking since the ground was rusted and everything around was, that may have been a big part of the problem. Thank you very much for the help! I really appreciate it!

[BMR]

Cool! Yup, sounds like the ground path was probably the culprit.