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Hella Supertone horns install SF

('01-'02) 
14K views 13 replies 10 participants last post by  bbottomley 
#1 · (Edited)
I installed my new Supertones yesterday on my 2002, and figured I would post a write up since I had to ask a whole lot of people to get some really simple answers. I used the stock horn locations for the lack of a second place to mount the other one behind the grill. I also put the lower pitched (300hz) in the front, behind the grill.

You can wire these two ways: with or without the supplied relay. Wiring them without the relay is a fine option. The horns are really loud just on the stock power. All you need to do is cut the single pin connector off of the old horn wire, strip it down a little, solder/connect it to either of the terminals on the Hella, and connect the other terminal to a good ground via another wire. On the stock horns, there is only a positive power wire because the ground is connected through the mounting bracket. Using the supplied relay to wire these is the way I chose to go, because I have heard both relayed and unrelayed Hellas and there is a pretty big difference. I figured I would do it right since I'm taking the time to do it at all.

The relay:

There are 5 pins on the bottom. This is the info I used to wire it properly.
#30 to battery (20a fused)
#86 to ground
#85 to wire coming from original horn
#87 to red wire of Hellas
Do not use #87a

The two red wires are power. I hooked up the green wire to the old horn wires to be the on/off switches. Black just went to ground.



Here is the fuse. I just went ahead and used a spare 20a fuse from my fusebox, soldered the power wire to the terminals, and wrapped it in electrical tape. My shrink wrap was too small to fit around the fuse.



Here you can see where the other red power wire and the green switch wire are routed, along with the fused red power wire going into the positive terminal of my battery. Subaru has all these convenient little holes, perfect for routing the wire and using zip ties to mount them!



Here is the in-depth picture of the first horn. You can see the red power wire. It goes to one of the terminals on the Hella and I soldered it on. Then I cut another length of red power wire, stripped it, and soldered it to the same terminal, in order to run it to the second Hella. The green switch wire is the same way. At the bottom of the picture, you can see it spliced in with the original horn wire. If you look closely, you can see a black ground wire coming from the rear of the Hella's mounting bracket, connected to the other Hella terminal, and then to the screw for ground. Almost all the connections are shrink wrapped, if not electrical taped, and all the wires are zip tied out of the way. Nothing touches the radiator or the horns.



Here is just a pic of the wire routing. Again with those great Subaru holes...perfect for running little zip ties to hold the wires! You can see the wires just go to the side of the radiator and back into the engine compartment.



This picture was taken from the rear. You can see the wires coming in from the radiator, and the green switch wire again connects to the original horn wire and the red power wire goes to one of the Hella's terminals. The other terminal gets a short black ground wire to the screw. You can also see that the Hella is mounted on the rear of the mounting tab. Although this is the stock location of my second horn, the Hella is too big to fit angled over behind the headlight, so I improvised in order to keep it on this mounting tab. This is the higher pitched (500hz) Hella mounted here. Again all connections shrink wrapped or electrical taped.



Front view, just the one horn showing here. Sorry about the mismatched grill and the bent hood. Both are salvage parts that I haven't really gotten around to properly repairing yet.



All in all the project took me about 3 hours to complete. I know it sounds like a lot, but I really really took my time in order to make good solder connections, shrink wrap everything, and route the wiring like I felt satisfied with. The horns worked the very first try, and sound fantastic. They are kind of higher pitched horns, but are crazy loud. Inside my closed garage they are even worse. Money well spent to get rid of the wimpy Japanese horn.

I picked these up here --> and using the code QUICK5, got them to my door super fast for $46.93 total., the cheapest price I've ever seen these for.

Anyway, this was my first official write up. Sorry for the stupid dirty engine bay and whatnot. I need to detail my car before my trip to Cali...let me know if I need to add anything or take some more specific pictures/instructions.

Erich
 
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#3 ·
The grille is just held on with a couple of plastic clips, very easy to get off.

Could we have a picture from the front with the grille back on please? I would love to see what it looks like with the bright red visible behind it.

Overall a very good write up, good job!
 
#5 ·
Just a few pieces of constructive criticism.
1. Buy a fuse holder, instead of soldering it in.
2. Get some wire loom to cover the wires
3. PUT GROMMETS IN ALL HOLES WHERE WIRES GO THROUGH! I see lots of places wires can get cut. This is what burns cars to the ground.

But good job in doing your homework, and doing it yourself.
 
#6 ·
I couldn't really find loom small enough for just these wires. But I only looked at one store, so I'll keep looking around. I will definitely take your advice on the grommets cause the last thing I need is this guy ending up on fire. And getting a fuse holder would improve the looks and ease of replacing it in the future too. Thanks for this!
 
#10 ·
Old thread bump for questions/suggestions:

-How many feet of wiring is needed to run it with the relay, approximately?
-Can you get by without a soldering gun and just crimp everything?
-How necessary is the fuse? (From what I can tell, instructions don't show it.)

-Instead of loom, wouldn't threading the wires thru a rubberlike hose work just fine.?.?
 
#11 ·
IIRC I used purchased about 2 metres, or around 7 feet

I crimped and soldered, where the harness split to both horns. I suppose a crimp could work as well.

Fuse is for safety, definitely worth using one IMO, as the few dollars extra could prevent a fire

Dunno about rubber hoses, maybe it would work fine. There's a guy on eBay that sells wiring loom at a dollar per metre for some decent, narrow loom that looks legit when used!

Don't forget waterproof heatshrink wrap!

Sent from AutoGuide.com Free App
 
#13 ·
I've updated the horns on all our cars using a similar approach. Just for reference, you can also use some highway blasters. These sound more like an old buick which I sort of prefer although I do have supertones on my Legacy.

This here is handy too since it has a fuse holder and a harness that plugs directly into the relay:



also the relay
 

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