I set some friends up with squeeze horns for their trip to Burning Man 2011. Some photos coming back now. Will add more as they come available.
Shortly after arrival.
Getting into the swing of things now.
Squeeze Horns on the Playa!
Author: John Runs This Place
We love squeeze horns! Especially the brass honkers we import from India! A labor of love. Happy Honking!
Mike Bruns’ 8 Foot Cruiser!
How cool is this! Makes sense that Mike wanted the 16″ squeeze horn for his bike. Check it out!
Thanks for the photo Mike Bruns of Roanoke IN.
Cleaning Your Squeeze Horn
Partly as an experiment I’ve left one of my squeeze horns on my bike for over a year. We don’t get snow here, but some rain, lots of fog, and salt air have taken their toll. You’ll also notice numerous dings and a massive dent from an accident that bent the horn in half. Fortunately it bent right back without breaking.
The lesson here is simple. If you want to keep your squeeze horn shiny, you’ll have to keep it indoors. On the other hand, a year of outdoor use, a little polish, and my squeeze horn looks like an antique and is working just fine.
Reader KP Sends Some Great Pics of a Very Large Horn!
In response to comment below…
Sir, you are in luck! While not the exact horn. I do have, in my personal collection, one large Taxi horn and I am attaching an mp3 for your listening pleasure.
Very Big Squeeze Horn:
Reader KP writes:
Hi John,
Found your website content very good and exciting! I had been to a vintage car rally in Pune, India and found an ample-sized horn attached to a 1969 Italian Piaggio “autorickshaw” (a 3-wheeler for public transport). I’m not sure about its size, but it must be somewhere around 24-30 inches long. I have attached a few pics of the vehicle with the horn. The sound was thunderous and kids enjoyed squeezing it. The owner said he had to import the horn from UK. I tried searching online but couldnt find any of this giant size.Keep up the good work!RegardsKP
Here’s the pics of an awesome horn. Don’t you want to hear it?
KP also had suggestions for the site especially around how I can accommodate contributions. I mentioned I’m in the process of building a Facebook page and hopefully will have something up in the next week or so. In the meantime please feel free to leave a comment or send me an email john[AT]squeezehorns.com
Thanks KP! Much appreciated.
Squeeze, or Bulb Car Horns!
Earliest car horns were all bulb horns.
From the same book came this picture of a reed. It’s very similar to those in the squeeze horns I sell, but with a screw to adjust tension of the reed.
I just did some experimenting with a reed I have and discovered that by pulling the top ‘tongue’ of the reed away from the main portion, ie. increasing the gap, I could lower the tone. This was done by bending the reed, which is a bit dangerous considering it’s impossible to bend it back. At some point I’ll do some serious experiments with adjusting the pitch and volume, and I think adding an adjusting screw could work!
Squeeze, or ‘Bulb’ Horns Used To Be Everywhere!
Happy to report that a new shipment of horns has landed in the US and is making it’s way to my door as we speak.
Very shortly I’ll have new pics and sounds up on the site.
In the meantime, I thought you might enjoy these reminiscences from the past.
From a 1945 Popular Mechanics! Frequently used as a musical instrument! Look at those horns!
Black Mini Condor Bicycle Squeeze Horn
I really like this horn. Nice balance. Loud enough to attract attention but not too aggressive. I’m partial to black as well. I’d put something like this on my mountain bike. Very small.
“4-Banger” Squeeze Horn!
Don’t see many of these around. Lots of 3 reed. Notice he’s using a hose clamp to attach it to his bike. Sometimes I feel a little wary of leaving my bike locked up somewhere because I’ve just got a wing nut holding my big brass 14″ horn on. You know, maybe it’s something someone would rip off. A hose clamp would certainly slow them down at least. There’s a 3 banger over at Amazon (affiliate link).
Squeeky Blue Schwinn Squeeze Horn
The benefits of a small, squeeky horn like this is that they feel ‘friendly’. Actually, I have 3 squeeze horns on my bike. A big 14″ honker for when I really need to get some attention. The small squeeze horn when I’m just intending to alert somebody, especially a pedestrian. And a mini squeeky horn just for fun with kids and dogs mostly. But I’m on the bike path a lot and the weekends are crazy with tourists who don’t know how it all works.
Squeeze Horn Sounds and Ringtones!
Well then. I took some time this evening to create a collection of Squeeze Horn sounds and (iphone, I would imagine they’ll work anywhere) ringtones. If you’re a sound person, you might like to download the larger 16 bit 44.k wav file (8.3 MB all sounds in a single file). But for fun here are the mp3 clips and ringtones.
Duckish squeeze horn:
Fat honking squeeze horn
Goosey honk squeeze hor
Loud bright squeeze horn
Medium honk squeeze horn
Sharp little squeeze horn
Soft dark squeeze horn
Enjoy!