I added the Lucas 9H Windtone Instruction Manual to the More Stuff column on the right. It has some good info for maintaining and adjusting your hooters, see? here we go...
Rootes used two brands of hooters, er, horns, Lucas 9H Windtones,
at least for Series IV and V (as far as I know) and for the early models (as
someone said on the forums), Clear Hooters F725T Twin Alpine horns (I know it’s
model F725 per the Series V Workshop manual, the “T Twin Alpine” part comes
from the Clear Hooter ad – see below).
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| Clear Hooters model F725 |
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| Clear Hooters ad showing the F725A Twin Alpine hooter |
Alphie clearly should have a nice set of hooters… sorry, there
will be more.
I have a set of Lucas and a set of Clear Hooters, neither of
which worked when I jolted them with 12 volts, so I performed a postmortem.
(Pic at the top of this post - A General Motors Delco Remy unit was in one of the boxes (or boot, I don't remember) that came with Alphie so it made the photo too.)
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| Autopsy photo of a Lucas hooter |
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| Lucas hooter after cleaning. It looks like it should work, but it doesn't |
Lucas Windtones
When you smash the horn button in a panic, you send
electricity to a small electromagnet that pulls against a plunger connected to
a diaphragm, pulling it towards the magnet.
The plunger has a “step” that pushes open a set of contact breakers much like the points contact breaker in the distributor. (See the pics.) When the contact opens, it deenergizes the magnet, and the diaphragm springs back to its original position. This process happens many times a second, and the movement vibrates the diaphragm, creating sound.
The low tone diaphragm is slightly thicker than the high
tone diaphragm, hence the different tones.
The Lucas horns have a large adjusting screw in the center of the case that
lengthens or shortens the diaphragm’s movement giving some further adjustment
or tuning of the tone.
The little setscrew near one of the terminals on the outside
of the horn would seem to be an adjustment as well, but it isn’t. The screw pushes against one side of the
contact plate to prevent it from bending and permanently closing the contacts over
time. It’s a factory setting, so don’t
mess with it.
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| The internals of a Lucas hooter |
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| Close up of the Lucas breaker/contact point |
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| The set-screw on the outside only adjusts this post, which only prevents the breaker point bracket from bending - it doesn't adjust the sound. |
Clear Hooters F725(T Twin Alpine)
The Clear Hooters work on the same principle, but the
mechanism is different. The Clear Hooter
uses two electromagnets that pull on a metal disc attached to the
diaphragm. The disc has a small plunger at
its center, which pushes a set of contacts (like the Lucas),breaking the circuit
when the disc reaches the magnets. When
the circuit breaks, the magnets deenergize and the diaphragm springs back,
creating vibration and thus the sound.
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| The breather hole allows the diaphragm to move but also allows water in with a good soaking |
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| The guts of a Clear Hooters, a bit more robust than the Lucases but still suseptible to too much water. |
The high tone Lucas was rusted so with a good cleaning, it
probably would work. The low tone one
though had a broken connection between the magnet coil and the contact breakers,
meaning the contacts would not open and the diaphragm would not vibrate.
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| Here's why on of the Lucases doesn't work. I tried fixing it but bodged the job badly. (Solder doesn't stick, in case you were wondering.) |
After a good cleaning, one of the Lucases kinda worked; it clicks and
buzzes, a little.
The Clear Hooters were much more rusted, and the autopsy showed that the diaphragm had holes rusted through it, so it would have sounded sick and weak if it worked at all. The other mechanisms looked to be in decent nick, however.
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| Cleaned but the rust throughs on the diaphram means this hooter hoots no more. |
Even with mixing parts from the high and low Clear Hooters, I couldn't get either to make more than a click...
The Solution
I needed more Hooters, never enough, and again, my apologies.
I found some more Clear Hooters on eBay.
Straight out of the box, I hit them with 12 volts and a flimsy,
buzzy “meeep”. I hoped they would make
me jump, but now I have two more Hooters to play with – will it ever end?
I cleaned the Hooters up, painted them, checked them with
the multimeter, reassembled them – they look smashing, by the way – but still
the anemic “meeep.”
Aftermarket? That would give me beefy blast I need, but I really want a set of original honkers, stretching a bit on that one.
The hunt for a nice
set of hooters continues.
I suspect the diaphragms are the biggest problem. I think the horns can take normal
environmental wetness, humidity, the occasional rain-through-the-grill, but not
thorough soakings like sitting under a tree for decades. Once the diaphragm rusts, it isn’t as
flexible as it needs to be. There is a
forum post where a guy fabricated himself some new diaphragms – impressive, but
more work than I’m willing to do for a set of hooters – you thought I didn’t
have anymore, but you were wrong.
The internal wiring isn’t protected from water other than
being in a sealed space. That space
however, has pin holes for air to move as the diaphragm moves. Once water gets in, the electricals, the
contact point especially, corrode.
Old hooters that have been spared the elements continue to hoot,
those that drink too much water, hoot no more.
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| Nice looking hooters that don't work very well |
I could have made a lot of horny jokes, but I'm a mature man of taste and manners...
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| Another Clear Hooters ad |
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