Landing Gear Warning Horn

[John Wasserburger]

Where is the landing gear warning horn located on a PA-30B? My horn stopped working. Is this horn tied into the stall warning system in any manner? I get a stall warning light that flashes about 5-10MPH prior to the stall, but no warning horn. Also, the landing gear warning horn does not work when the throttles are at idle with the gear handle in the UP position. Webco indicated they don't sell landing gear warning horns anymore.

Thanks,

John Wasserburger

[Zach Grant L1011jock]

John,
It could be the horn, but I doubt it. The horn is under the panel, most likely attached to the firewall (looks like a round grey box with a circular cover on the end held on with a single center screw, like a small scale air cleaner housing from a golden era muscle car...). This horn is actuated when one or both throttles are reduced below the second micro switch in the throttle quadrent (first flashes the gear up light) and that throttle position should equate to about 14" mp if set up right.

The important part here is that the nose gear down limit switch is the only one that the horn looks at. All three limit switches must make to turn on the green, but only the nose must make to keep the horn from blowing, a fail safe of sorts incase you don't get a green, if the nose is down, by default all the rest are down or you are having a very bad day.

I would bet dollars to doughnuts that the nose gear switch is bad, or you have a bad wire harness, and the horn and gear down circuit thinks the nose gear is down all the time. Start there. The wireing diagrams are in the service manual under technical on the main Comancheflyer.com page. Good luck.

-Zach

[N8632Y]

John,
i test my gear alert horn almost every flight. I find it is hard to hear sometimes. The other day I had to turn the radios down to hear it.
steve

[Zach Grant L1011jock]

Steve,
The volume is adjustable by losening the screw on the front of the horn. It should be plenty loud! If you forget the gear, you shouldn't have to turn the radios down for you to have your memory jogged by the horn....
-Zach

[N8632Y]

Thank Zach!
You know, i was thinking that in the past it was louder, but just got out of annual, and I like to go thru system checks etc, gear horn is on almost every flight, and I didn't remember it being so low.
They did work on the panel light knob, which is connected to gear lights, and maybe somehow fiddling in the area? who knows, but i'll check on it again, I do remember it being loud, thought my IPOD was on too loud......
steve, thanks again..

[John Wasserburger]