Any Outlander owner knows exactly how wimpy the stock horn is. Well, there are actually two stock horns installed but that makes no difference, they suck. This little guide is going to show you how to remove your grill and install some better horns. In this case I used , but you can use practically any horn, there are plenty of good cheap ones.

The Hella Supertones have long been known as one of the best electric horns. Unfortunately many of the new ones are made in India instead of Sweden or Germany as they use to be. The ones I received were made in India, but they look to be made well.




Alright, we really need to remove the grill to install these. You can leave it on and install them somewhere else if you dont want to go through this work. They likey wont project as much of the sound outward though.

This is the first panel that needs removed. Its located right where the hood latch is. There are 4 plactic retainers to remove. To remove these take a small flat head screwdriver and pop the center up. This releases the "mushroom" behind the panel and allows you to remove them.




Once the panel is removed you will see 3x 10mm bolts, remove these.

 

Next there is a small panel in the middle of the grill. Behind this there is another 10mm bolt, remove this.




If your model has fog lights you should remove these to make it a little easier. Turn the bezel counterclockwise and remove. Behind this there will be 3 phillips head screws holding the lights. Remove these and unclip the wire from the light.




There is one mushroom fastener and one screw mushroom fastener in each fender well. Remove these.





Under the bottom of the fascia there are several 10mm bolts, remove these. There are maybe a dozen mushroom fasteners along the bottom edge of the fascia that need removed as well. (sorry, no pictures of this)

Once that is done you must unclip the facia from the front fenders. This takes a little force so be careful.


There is also 2 snap connectors hidden toward the middle of the grill. Just pull the grill away from the frame at this point, again be careful.

 

You can pull the grill/fascia away at this point. Note that there is one wire snap connector that needs to be unclipped as you pull it away. Now we can see those wimpy horns.



You can see that these use their body as the ground while the Hellas use a separate connector. Ill show you how to overcome this later. The bolt to remove the horns is a 12mm oddly enough.

 

Alright, the Hella horns draw 5.5amps EACH! We dont want to put that load on what looks like 20AWG wires that currently drive the horn. What well do is use a relay. The Hella kit comes with one. Youll want to buy a relay socket to make your work easier and cleaner.

Doing the calculations with 2% acceptable loss shows we need a 17AWG wire. Buy 16AWG wire, youll need about 10ft.

The diagram below is essentially what were dealing with. We will use the existing horn wire to drive a relay that will complete a circuit direct from the battery with 16AWG wire. Not shown is a fuse between the battery and relay.




My vehicle had a very convenient place to connect this new power wire. There is an integrated fuse block on the positive battery connector and mine just so happened to have an empty slot. The nut was missing from the stud but I was able to find one in my spares.

 

Take your time and run the wires to hide them behind the metal bumper. You will have to create a jumper to go from the negative connection on each horn to the bolt that holds the horn to the frame. See below:



You will also need to create a jumper from the negative switching part of the relay to ground. Here you can see I went from the relay to the bolt that holds the hood latch. I later had to remove the relay from where it is attached and behind the center metal structure as it interfered with the air re-director.

I covered all my wires in braided cable sleeve and used heat shrink at every connector. This isn't necessary but creates a cleaner overall installation.

 

And here's what the final installation looks like. You can hardly see them behind the grill. They are MUCH louder than stock, though not the advertised 118dB. I recorded 98dB at 5 feet with my cell phone.

 

Wow. Thanks for that, ckmecha! I've been thinking about doing this modification myself.

Thank you for the wiring tips and the warning about the fender clips and snap connectors. When I replace my horns, it'll help me a lot.

 

Now that i think about it, you probably dont need to remove the fog lights. I didnt pay enough attention, but the wiring connector you have to unclip when removing the fascia is probably for the fog lights.

 

Hrm. The service manual appears to confirm your thought.

 

I hate supertones.