Sticky & Sensitive Horn (1 Viewer)

[TheForger]

I did some searching and came across a few other threads on this issue, but all the fixes suggested had to do with either a bad horn relay or water intrusion - neither of which I have. My problem seems to lie within the steering wheel itself and I’m thinking some contact points that trigger the horn to sound.

Long story short, this issue first presented itself New Years Eve and I’ve had to disconnect my horn in the meantime. My horn sounds if I just barely touch the bottom left corner with one finger, and will also trigger if I go over certain speed bumps in my neighborhood. Occasionally if I try to steer by pushing my knee into the bottom of the wheel it will go off as well. The only way I’ve found to stop it is to grab the edges of the airbag/horn module in the wheel and gently pull it towards me. I posted a video trying to replicate the issue for others to see.

Like I said I’ve had to disconnect the horn so it won’t randomly go off driving down the road, but I would really like to get this fixed if possible. Does anyone know the anatomy of the horn electrical system inside of the steering wheel? I’m not afraid to pull the airbag and take a look, I’d just like an idea of what to look for first. Any help would be greatly appreciated!

 

[TheForger]

Found an inspection procedure in the FSM for the horn components inside the wheel so I'll give that a shot tomorrow and see what happens.

I also found this thread on BobIsTheOilGuy where several guys were discussing the same issue in their respective (albeit different make/model) vehicles. If you scroll down to a post by GMBoy he stated, "It is not the horn button. The problem is below your steering wheel in the column. The SIR COIL wire is shorting out to ground when turning the wheel. Take off the wheel and look for damaged wires - should be really easy and obvious. Reroute it and tape it up. Easy job. Remove a battery cable and let it sit a few minutes to disable the air bag system. Pull the driver airbag and you may see the wire. If not, take off the nut holding the wheel and look under. Pretty common issue. You can fix it yourself."

I might try looking for any wires that are possibly frayed while I'm in there because sometimes my horn would go off when I turned, but not nearly as often as when I would gently press it. Will update tomorrow if I have the time to tackle this.

 

[Ayune]

Subscribed. I got the same light-touch issue on the lower left corner, right where my hand lies much of the time. I’m the inadvertently honking jerkwad in traffic.

I plan to inspect under the airbag pad and bend that contact a little to increase the travel needed to close the circuit.

 

[MongooseGA]

Someone got really pissed at traffic and punched your airbag/horn pad to relieve their frustration, resulting in a contact inside the wheel that is too sensitive now.

I mean, that's just a guess. I'm definitely not speaking from experience. I totally didn't have to take off the horn pad and fix my own mistake of letting road rage get the best of me in my old LX. Nope, didn't happen.

But you might try removing it and having a look inside.

 

[TheForger]

Someone got really pissed at traffic and punched your airbag/horn pad to relieve their frustration, resulting in a contact inside the wheel that is too sensitive now.

I mean, that's just a guess. I'm definitely not speaking from experience. I totally didn't have to take off the horn pad and fix my own mistake of letting road rage get the best of me in my old LX. Nope, didn't happen.

But you might try removing it and having a look inside.

That is great to hear someone else had a similar issue on this forum, how did you end up fixing it once you got inside? Come to think of it, this did start on New Years Eve and there's no telling how many times I hit my horn that night with all the idiots on the road

 

[MongooseGA]

I don't remember exactly what I did to fix it but I do remember it was pretty easy once I took the cover off. It may have been that one of the screws holding it centered got tweaked and needed to be removed and replaced straight.