The stock horn on my gixxer was pathetic. There's no way I was going to bet my life on some nitwit hearing that. You've got to realize that there are three main type of people on the road:
You get my point: there are an awful lot of people on the road that are just NOT going to hear you with that feeble stock horn. And this can mean the difference between life and death - YOUR life or death. So you should really make this the absolute first mod that you do to your bike. Look around and get the absolute loudest, most shocking horns you can get and thrown them on the bike. Then enjoy the next time that old lady wanders into your lane and you can casually blast her back into consciousness with a press of your thumb.
I think you basically have two choices:
Sample sound file of the Wolo horns in action.
Here's where I put my dual Fiamm horns, high tone and low tone. The location is just behind the front forks, in front of the radiator. In this picture, front is to the right, rear is to the left.
The Horns are just barely small enough to fit. Unfortunately you can't see very well where I bolted them. The horn on the left (furthest from the camera) is just mounted in place of the stock horn. The right horn (closer to the camera) is mounted to the right radiator bolt. I had to go to the hardware store to get a slightly longer-than-stock bolt, and used a piece of scrap metal that I bent and drilled in order to fit this horn in. Very very easy to do.
Wiring the Fiamm horns is unbelieveably simple. The left horn just gets connected to the stock wires. The right horn (#2) is just connected by a simple parallel circuit. You can just tap the stock wires on the left, and attach some extra wire to reach over to the right radiator bolt mounting location.
By the way, the O/G wire is hot whenever the ignition is on. The B/Bl wire is the one that is actually switched by the stock left handlebar horn button. When the button is NOT pressed, this wire is dead (not connected to anything). When you press the stock horn button, the B/Bl wire is connected to ground, allowing the horn circuit to be closed, and allowing the horn to sound.
These horns sound like a typical set of American car horns - like my old '73 Pontiac. Yes, they are a big improvement over stock, but really are not going to shock anyone - the sound is good, but not really going to have the "racing heart, colon-blow" effect I was looking for.
Another rider, Oliver (gixxer.com #10233), tested these Fiamm horns on his '02 GSXR-1000. He used an B-pitched horn, F-pitched horn (i.e. a hi tone and low tone) and compared them to the stock horns. For his measurements, Oliver used "C-weighted" decibel measurements. By this method, Oliver says that a difference of 6dB would be interpreted by the human ear as approximately twice as loud. That means that 106 dB on this scale would sound twice as loud to the human ear as 100 dB. Oliver used the single stock horn alone, and various combinations of the Fiamm horns with stock. His findings are noted below:
Radio Shack analog SPL meter, all measurements taken @ 1meter from the horns, SPL meter set to SLOW response time, C-weighted scale, 2002 GSXR-1000:
There are two main points as I see it, from the numbers above. First, there is a true advantage of installing both horns as opposed to a single Fiamm horn. One fiamm horn will not be perceptibly louder than the stock horn was - because a difference in "intensity" of only 1 or 2dB is a barely noticeable difference in loudness to the human ear. With my own ear, a single Fiamm horn was not an improvement over stock. And of course if you were to install just one horn, it should be the high tone, because high tones are much more noticeable to the human ear.
Second, Oliver's findings confirm that, when both Fiamm horns are used, the result should be louder than stock - NOT and huge increase in loudness, but one that is noticeable.
A discussion of decibels, power, intensity, and perceived loudness is beyond the scope of my web site. But a few basic rules are good to keep in your head:
The bottom line: be looking for something above 100dB. A power lawnmower at a distance of 3 feet is in the range of 107 dB. A jet plane at a distance of 100 feet is 130 dB. Something in between that range would be great to have.
Although the Fiamm horns are good, and EXTREMELY easy to install, in my opinion, nothing tops a good set of air horns for an instant laxative effect on the cager's bowels. I highly recommend this mod to your ride. And if you were only to install EITHER Fiamms or airhorns, I'd suggest going for the air horns. But why not have both? Read on ....
As you'll see below, I've installed The Wolo X1000 Xtreme Air Horns. I have mounted these with a control button on the RIGHT handlebar. I kept the the dual Fiamm horns wired to the stock LEFT handlebar switch. This way I can actually sound either set of horns, depending on the mood that strikes me
These horns are rated at 118dB, stated by the manufacturer. That should be about 10 dB louder than the stock horn, roughly twice as loud as the stock horn, judged by the human ear. The cost to me was $24.95 at Autobarn.
Complete installation instructions: .pdf file, about 2.5MB.
**For 2003/2004 GSXR, scroll to bottom of this page.
Extra Parts you need to buy:
That's it -- everything else you need including the relay, is included when you buy the horns.
A minor note that occurred to me while looking at the WOLO XTREME airhorn wiring diagram. It may be confusing which wire to connect to the relay, once you disconnect your stock horn. When you disconnect your stock horn, you should pull two wires off it: the O/G wire (always hot when ignition is on) and the B/Bl wire (only connected to ground when the left handlebar horn button is pressed). The stock horn is "negatively switched", meaning it always is supplied with + voltage, but the horn is OFF anyway because it does not have a valid ground connection. Only when you press the horn botton is the b/bl wire grounded, now completing the circuit, so that the horn sounds.
Ignore the O/G wire. For these horns it need not be used. Remember the HOT supply for this air compressor will be wired directly from the battery with large gauge (16 awg) wire, so you don't need the O/g wire anymore to supply voltage. Just SECURELY cover the end with tape and shrink tubing to make sure it doesn't short to anything, then tuck it away. The only stock wire you'll be using for your airhorns is that B/Bl switched ground wire.
Just connect the stock black/blue stripe wire (B/Bl) to pin 85 of the relay, as shown in the diagram.
Well, I decided to see if I could fit this air horn kit on the Gixxer. Here's where I finally mounted the horns. You can see how cheap and unattractive the blue plastic horns look. They are definitely NOT intended to be visible! They were actually made for cars, assuming that they would be mounted under the hood, out of site. I'd agree with that! Don't get them unless you have somewhere to hide them!
Now my wiring is a little different than is showed in the diagram above - because I wanted to keep my Fiamm horns on the left handlebar, and install the new horns on the right. Download my complete installation file to see all the details.
The RIGHT handlebar seemed like the perfect place to mount a switch for a SECOND set of horns. There is this rectangular piece of plastic just BEGGING to be violated with a new switch. So just take apart the control housing, pop out the piece of plastic and go to work with the Dremmel to insert your switch.
Here's that little black piece of plastic taken from the control housing. I drilled a hole through it with the dremmel, then just kept widening the hole until it was big enough to get my switch inserted.
Then you stick it back in and reassemble your control housing on the right handlebar. Then take one very long 22-guage wire (black is best) and run it all the way back to your relay and attach to pin 85. The space directly behind the battery is the best place to stick the relay. Heavy gauge wire is unnecessary for THIS part of the wiring, since the switch will only carry enough current to activate the relay (about 160 mA). The switch has NOTHING to do with the HUGE current draw needed by the compressor.
Here's the right handlebar control assembly all put back together, now with my new round black little button. My new secret weapon to make the cagers pee in their pants!.
If you take off your rear cowling, stand facing the REAR of the bike. You'll see a space to the rear of the battery, and in front of the trunk, on the left. That space is PERFECT for this compressor! It just fits in there snug, with no mounting needed at all. You can see it in the pic below -- the silver cylinder with the blue plastic top. You can also see how I drilled a hole in the trunk plastic to allow the air hose to come through and connect to the two horns.
I squished everything in with a couple of cable ties. Then put your rear cowling and undertail back on -- it's a bit of a tight squeeze, but it WILL fit. Note that my bike is a 2002 GSXR-1000, with a Mototeck undertail, so your specific bike may be different. Take a good look at the tail on your bike - but if in doubt, just give it a try - for only $25, it's not a big risk.
Since I did not use the stock horn switch to control these horns, you don't have to worry about the stock horn button wires at all. Just run one 22-gauge LONG wire from the right handlebar all the way back to your relay (which I put behind the battery- plenty of room there ). Then take the other lead from your pushbutton and connect it to any available B/W wire on the Suzuki. Done!
Here's how a buddy, 1Kwik6, did this on his bike. He ran his hoses a little differently. The important point is that his bike (which has a 750 engine) has a 600 frame. I don't know if there are any differences in the frame from 600 through 1000 bikes, but it's nice to know that these airhorns COULD be installed on a 600.
THIS is how I actually connected my compressor and relay, using the Radio Shack #275-644 momentary switch, and the SPST relay supplied with the air horns. Download a higher-resolution version of this diagram by clicking the image.
It is very important to use HUGE wire for the actual compressor circuit. The manufacturer suggests 16-gauge wire, but I used 14 since I had some available. This compressor REALLY draws the current! I've indicated in red the places where you should use 14 (or 16) gauge wire.
What do I think? I'm very pleased with these horns. Here's my rating:
The horns on the bikes PRIOR TO 03'04 were negatively switched. This means that when you pressed the horn button, you connected the GROUND wire of the circuit, completing the circuit and allowing the horn to sound.
But on the '03/'04 bikes they are positively switched instead. So these bikes have constant connection to ground all the time. When you press the horn button, you are allowing a connection to the power wire, and the horn sounds. So when you wire your air horns, and you wire the relay, you want to think of a way that the horn button will switch the POWER to the compressor on and off, rather than the ground wire on and off as we showed above with the older bikes.
Well, a picture is worth a thousand words. Here is what I suggest you do:
Make the connections as shown. You'll notice that two wires are connected to the stock horn. Pay attention to the one that is NOT green . This is what I call the mystery wire, because the color of this wire is unknown to me. I'll need someone who has the '03/'04 to tell me what color it is...
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