99 460DA horns

[PascalG]

any idea how the horns work on a 460 Dancer, 99 vintage?

a friend of mine has one, horns are dead. the compressor works, air is coming out of the hose at the bow but no sound. Pulled them out, they're made by AFI. opened them up there is really nothing in there except a thin clear plastic diaphragm. how the heck do these work?

 

[boatn]

Pascal, I have those horns on my boat. During spring commisioning I normally have to open the pump and spray everything down with WD40. The vanes inside the pump stick a little and it takes alot of air for the horns to work. I also open up the horns and wipe down that "clear plastic diaphram" with WD40. Since it sounds like both horn are not working I bet the vanes in the compressor are sticking and you're not getting full air volume.

And thanks for taking me on your trip south.

 

[dominic]

You should be able to just blow into the horn to test if the horn works. If those thin diaphrams get wet the horn won't make any noise.

The internals of the horns can get wet from dipping the bow, over zealous washing with a hose, VERY heavy sea spray, etc.

Last season at anchor in the ocean watching an air show in heavy seas, I dipped the bow a few times and the horns stopped working. I was able to remove and disassemble the horns, dry out the diaphrams on a paper towel and then reassemble....the horns worked fine after that.

 

[PascalG]

thks for the info guys... will try that. the diaphrgam were a little wet and there was something that looked like white grease in the cavity of the metal cover. I tried blowing thru and it was almost impossible.

an idea how to get to the compressor? seems like its over the bulkhead between the fwd SR and the saloon.