I have a "General Lee" dixie horn. Been through all the catalogs I can find, without any luck. The Dixie horn is what I want. Just the wrong song.
What I am looking for is someone to build an air horn to play the first 7 notes of Rudolph the red nose reindeer.
Cheap electronic horns would 'work'...... I guess, but I really want authentic air horns
If nobody custom builds anything like this, any have any ideas on how could I go about doing it myself?
I think using some cheap musical Christmas decoration that plays Rudolph and running it a small amp & speaker may be your best bet.
Wolo model 336, its not an air horn but it comes with 34 pre-programmed songs (many christmas tunes but no Rudolf) and a keyboard to program your own.
Optionally you could contact Wolo and see if they'd make a custom air horn, they are one of the biggest producers and your best bet.
The Wolo 345, has 50 songs, 9 animal sounds and 10 sirens and one of the songs is Rudolf :)
I also seek custom air horns to play the Imperial March from Star Wars. The electronic versions just aren't the same.
Thinking I am probably going to pick up a wolo 345 just fora cheap pa.
But I don't think you can select the songs anyway. It just plays them all.
And while icecream truck sounds are fun. Not the same as real air horns
Ok... So if Carl Frei can pull this off...
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t6nAVC-XL8E&feature=share&list=UU-DxbvdjRlaK8uG8eRA5Yiw
Then I think I can make something happen with this... I finally got around to popping the top from my "Dixie" horn...
Thinking I will probably just make a disk out of an old splash guard...
Air compressor, solenoid valve, three linear actuators, arduino, and a trumpet.
Looking at the generic three air horn setup, the actual horn part looks the same shape and all that changes is the length of the tube. Buy one measure the length and the note. Cut a new tube for the note needed.
I looked at the JC Whitney catalog and they have one Wolo horn specifically mentioned as playing Dixie, along with other horns that play various other tunes and sounds.
I'd say modifiying the horn is doable.
Here is the sheet music for Dixie:
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/4/4c/Dixe%27s_Land_Sheet_Music.jpg
and Rudolph:
http://www.musicnotes.com/sheetmusic/mtdFPE.asp?ppn=MN0098373&ref=google
Dixie is in a lower key, but you might be able to transpose Rudoplh down to use your Dixie horns. When I get home tonight, I'll try playing around with it.
Looking at the first two bars of each, it looks promising. The tricky part will be getting the tempo correct.
I hate you for putting a Christmas song in my head for the rest of the day. The only thing worse than this if I heard this horn blasting outside my garage door.
I do have a few neighbors who I'd like to do this to, though...
In reply to Kramer:
Ian F wrote: I'd say modifiying the horn is doable. Here is the sheet music for Dixie: http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/4/4c/Dixe%27s_Land_Sheet_Music.jpg and Rudolph: http://www.musicnotes.com/sheetmusic/mtdFPE.asp?ppn=MN0098373&ref=google Dixie is in a lower key, but you might be able to transpose Rudoplh down to use your Dixie horns. When I get home tonight, I'll try playing around with it. Looking at the first two bars of each, it looks promising. The tricky part will be getting the tempo correct.
Like to keep the dixie horn around if I could... So I plan on buying at least one more horn set if this plexiglass disc can be made to work to play right....
If you could help me pick which horn would have all the right horns (notes) in the right key....
Well... Here are the choices..
WEDDING MARCH LA CUCARACHA dIXIELAND DUKES OF HAZZARD EYES OF TEXAS GODFATHER CALL TO THE POST LA BAMBA THE CHARGE TEQUILA VAMOS ALLA PLAYA ALMA LLANERA Oh SUSANNAH MACARENA STAR TREK
http://www.wolo-mfg.com/spec.htm
Here is the Dixie horn "disk" Numbered as it plays... Color coded with the horn color codes... ect...
Ok. Looked at a bit last night. This will take some time. An overlay of the distribution manifold would help well. Also an indication where the "zero" clock is in relation to the disc and the manifold. It's possible each model uses a different manifold, but it's hard to say without seeing them all side-by-side. Might have to fabricate a new manifold as well to get the timing right.
Listening to the horn samples, it really sounds like they are pretty much using the same set of horns and transposing each song to work with their selection of horns.
What I was playing around with yesterday was taking a piece of plexiglass, centering it up.... Drilling a hole using the manifold as a jig. I would just drill the note... rotate X number of degrees and then drill again.
I was having some problems with this method though... Not being able to perfectly center the disk. ect.. So then I took one of my cutouts on cardstock.. and just made the center just right so I could hold it centered... Then rotated through what i thought the song should be poking holes with a pencil... Then I copied this to a Plexiglass disk...
It seemed to work, but some of the notes were weak... and upon trying to enlarge the hole I cracked the plexi... So I superglued and sanded this test disk smooth.... I think this is going to work.. I just need to experiment with the timing... and the horns I have don't seem to have the right notes... But...
I drilled... Red yellow red black blue yellow red.
It works well enough to prove it can work.. but still doesn't sound good.. This being a combo of wrong tones and timing, making it hard for me to discern exactly what is off and by how much.
I don't see how... But I wonder if somehow the voids in the manifold effect it somehow also?
Only on this board would a topic like this be taken so seriously. Love it!
Arise from the depths of hell thread I command thee!!
All joking aside had ANYONE figured something out that works for this? I have searched the intranet internet the web and even the dark web and I can't find anyone that got it right. I have 3 weeks to make an automotive airhorn play final fantasy "fanfare" so I can humiliate my best friend who thinks he has built a faster "secret" car than me. Well Jokes on him I built and EVEN FASTER more secret car. Long story short whenever I win at something and he loses I used to mouth trumpet that tune. I am nerd I know don't rub it in. Anyway thanks for any help you probably dont have!
You didn't read the thread, did you?
JThw8 said:Wolo model 336, its not an air horn but it comes with 34 pre-programmed songs (many christmas tunes but no Rudolf) and a keyboard to program your own.
Optionally you could contact Wolo and see if they'd make a custom air horn, they are one of the biggest producers and your best bet.
RossD said:Air compressor, solenoid valve, three linear actuators, arduino, and a trumpet.
Looking at the generic three air horn setup, the actual horn part looks the same shape and all that changes is the length of the tube. Buy one measure the length and the note. Cut a new tube for the note needed.
Meh. I like your idea but linear actuators work best with Trombones. Should add an LVDT in there too so the Arduino knows where the slide is.
I have an old set of Maserati Air Horns on my Miata. I saw those for sale everywhere back in the day.
Maybe you could find some of those at a swap meet or on e-bay.
Now I want air horns that play the opening bars to Toccata and Fugue in D minor.
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