More on our California coastal trip in the Hyundai Veracruz.
We were about to head home from gorgeous Carmel when we discovered the horn wasn't working. Not making a single sound, no matter how hard or where you smacked it...
The horn is an important safety feature. And my honey was getting nervous.
"Shouldn't we take it to get fixed before we get on the road?" he asks. No way, I said. I'm not spending hours in a dealership before we start a 6+ hour road trip. Granted, a broken horn might be a sign of an electrical problem, but everything else seemed to be working fine... I decided to take my chances.
I made it home without a hitch. But we'll get the Veracruz checked out and report back on the cause of the horn malfunction. At less than 10,000 miles, it's a weird thing to happen.
-- Joanne Helperin, Senior Features Editor, @ 9200 miles
greenpony says:
06:16 PM, 05/14/08
I've heard of a similar problem on a couple VW's. Turns out the horn was on a circuit with many other electric doodads, and one of those was causing a short which blew the fuse.
Yes, I know Hyundai and VW are worlds apart, but this is just something to consider. Is there anything else not working?
firstwagon says:
07:24 PM, 05/14/08
"The horn is an important safety feature."
Is the horn really a safety feature?
If you have the time to hit the horn in hopes that the other guy will do something, you have time to do something yourself first.
The purpose of the horn is only to let other people know that they pissed you off.
carmizvi says:
07:48 PM, 05/14/08
The Great White North
"Is the horn really a safety feature?"
If you're a teenager pulling up for your date with the head of the cheerleading squad - whose father happens to be an ex-Marine - then a working horn can be the ultimate safety feature.
clay92 says:
09:04 PM, 05/14/08
The same thing has happened with our '07 Accord V6. The horn doesn't work anymore.
tmanz says:
10:28 PM, 05/14/08
"If you have the time to hit the horn in hopes that the other guy will do something, you have time to do something yourself first."
yeah, like swerve into the concrete barrier that is to your left to avoid the driver that just decided they'd like their car to occupy the space that your car is currently traveling in. Or hit your brakes and hope the driver behind you looks up from what they are doing to kill time behind the wheel before their car becomes part of yours.
Those are much better options than waking up the driver next to you so they get back into their lane.
banhugh says:
04:10 AM, 05/15/08
Did you check the fuse box? This is probably a burned fuse result. 10min DIY replacement, maximum. Then your honey will be relaxed again.
2002blksle says:
06:17 AM, 05/15/08
The Hyundai Veracruz commercials make some lofty claims about the car being quiet. Maybe there is so much sound insulation that you just can't hear the horn???
Sometimes you get what you pay for.
firstwagon says:
07:33 AM, 05/15/08
"Those are much better options than waking up the driver next to you so they get back into their lane"
Or you could just tap your brakes and the idiot would slide in front of you. No need to freak out and crash over something as everyday as someone changing lanes without looking.
tmanz says:
09:27 AM, 05/15/08
"Or you could just tap your brakes and the idiot would slide in front of you. No need to freak out and crash over something as everyday as someone changing lanes without looking."
That is assuming there isn't an idiot barreling down on you from behind at the same time. It takes more than a tap on the brakes to drop a full car length behind in an instant. In a perfect world there wouldn't be another car 5 feet off the rear bumper but sometimes there is. But hey, as long as you don't have to honk, who cares if there is a 20 car pileup behind you when it is done.
If the car next to you has already started moving over into your lane you don't have time for a gingerly slight tap on the brakes. That works fine if the car that is coming over is mostly infront of you rather than right beside you. Then a slight tap will move their bumper far enough past yours.
Seriously, it isn't necessary to panic every time anything happens on the road but things happen fast sometimes. Cars moving over without looking generally don't do so slowly. "Tap" on the brakes a bit too lightly and they'll catch the front end of your car and you'll both go spinning around. For me I'll honk AND move to avoid them. I'll just stick to assuming that the drivers behind me are as bad as the one next to me.
I've averted more vehicle to vehicle contacts than you could count on one hand by a quick honk of the horn. Sometimes they weren't even involving me, I just saw what was about to happen ahead and my honk woke up the driver without the one they were about to hit even noticing.
tmanz says:
09:33 AM, 05/15/08
and just wait till you sit through a green light while the driver ahead of you tries to decide of that cloud in the sky looks more like a dog jumping or a horse sleeping
researchqueen says:
12:43 PM, 05/15/08
There's nothing else wrong with the car right now. I'm going to let our fleet manager figure out if it's a fuse or something more sinister and then one of us will report back.
I'll leave it to the rest of you duke it out over whether or not a horn is required for safety, but it seems pretty obvious to me.
langlebl says:
01:05 PM, 05/15/08
My mom's 06 Acura RL did the same thing shortly after she got it. She'd push the horn and it wouldn't hit a lick. It was fixed under warranty. I can't remember what it was, but it took very little time to repair.
altimadude00 says:
07:56 PM, 05/15/08
How do people in California pass their driving tests? Drivers not paying attention to their driving should have their license taken away. You can do all that stuff while you're riding on the bus just as easily.
No wonder car companies come up with all this "safety" junk (lane departure warning, lane keeping assist, radar cruise control). They cater to lazy people that forget that driving a car is more important than checking your Blackberry.
briancam says:
08:18 AM, 05/16/08
Our driving tests are held at the beach, there's very little actual driving involved.
estreka says:
07:32 PM, 05/17/08
My mom is a horn-user. It scares the hell out of me, too. She looks far ahead (a good thing), but she takes her driving hand off the wheel and hovers the horn (bad). Her right hand is always on the shifter (like mom, like son). I never use the horn. I don't even know what my horn sounds like. My instinctual reaction is to perform evasive maneuvers.