Gear Horn ideas? Not what you think

[kevin anderson]

Hope you all are doing well, I am looking for gear horn ideas.  No not the inside the cockpit let me know my gear is not down.   

What I am interested in, is if anyone has set up a small loud horn inside their gear well that they can activate to let people on the ground know to watch out.  

I have recently moved to an airpark, and at times people walk and walk their dogs along the sides of the grass runway.   We put up yellow flags on the windsock poles, but I have already had one landing where someone was walking at about where I touched down.  

I would hate for someone to decide to step out onto the runway during touchdown or roll out.

Thanks

Kevin 

[Ryan Bluestein]

While I haven't done it, I presume it would be pretty easy to wire up a horn from a car into the glider and just put it on a switch in the panel. Probably only a couple bucks to buy from a junkyard.

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[Marc Brinker]

I agree with Ryan that it would probably be pretty easy to wire up a 12V auto horn. However, many auto horns are just not that loud, so you could consider an aftermarket horn designed for motorcycles. I have installed them on my m/c's to replace the anemic OEM horns. Much louder, and the shell will direct the sound forward if you mount it correctly - an important consideration. 

Here's one option - there are even louder options, but they start to get heavy, and the current draw is significant (5A just from this model; others go up to 20A). 

https://denalielectronics.com/products/tt-sb-10200-b

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[Jeffrey N Banks]

Kevin,

I have in the past used a freon powered portable boat horn.  I don’t think its freon, however

I think I saw them at a WalMart boat section.

Just put it in the pocket.   It is very loud.

Jeff

N9

[Charles Mampe]

I have heard of a "gas boat horn" being used as well. Reasonable size, open vent and stick it out and trigger it.

Something like this...

https://www.etrailer.com/Emergency-Supplies/Attwood/AT25ZR.html?feed=npn&utm_id=568114413&msclkid=bf525f0c0c9b197521cc368ccc4b41cb&utm_source=bing&utm_medium=cpc&utm_campaign=Bing%20%7C%20Shop%20-%20Low%20Volume&utm_term=4577198194958082&utm_content=Everything%20Else

Granted, a button on the stick or panel would be nicer to use, but it's not a common need.

Heh, maybe do a low speed pass to alert everyone and then land!

I jest, I jest.

[Mark Mocho]

There are lots of them on Amazon.

Amazon.com : Saillong 2 Pack 1.4oz Marine Boat Air Horn, Loud Air Horns for Safety, Mini Small Blow Fog Bear Horn, Meet Coast Guard, Emergency Use for Marine Boating Sporting Events Outdoor Alarm : Sports & Outdoors

[Glenn Betzoldt]

Get a PA system, that would be more fun.

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[Cliff Hilty]

I used to have a small horn that operated on the small co2 cylinders that you use in air bb guns when I was hang gliding. We operated out of a ranchers field in Florida and cows where always in the landing area. A quick blast on short final got them moving out of the way! 😉

Cliff

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[Scott Calvert]

FWIW,

Sounds more like an educational problem.  It is an airport first and a park second.  Signage and educate all using it.

If a horn is needed, airhorn is probably the best solution.  Car horn is big an uses a lot of current.  Now add it to you checklist!

[Gordon Wingate]

Why not a whistle secured to the landing gear armature? That way you are making noise whenever the gear is down. Simpler and the noise will also remind you that you left the gear down after tow. You might be able to experiment and find an angle so that it only sounds at the AOA of your landing speed and not when you are on tow. 

Gordon

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[Mark Mocho]

Whistles can sometimes emit sound at a pitch some humans cannot hear due to age related or environmental hearing loss. An air horn is generally at a lower pitch that lets you annoy a wider range of people.

[Ryan Bluestein]

A friend of mine suggested a train horn.... 

It would be pretty funny to see one of those mounted on a retraction mechanism like a jet sustainer.

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[Eric Greenwell]

I flew with a fellow out of the airpark where he lived. He did exactly that - a low pass to alert people. He did make sure he always arrived high enough to do at least one pass; apparently, that was SOP for airpark, and everyone living there knew it was time move away from the runway. 

Eric

[Cliff Hilty]

I did that flying into Coyote springs on Fridays when they were doing hangliding reverse electric tow operations and they scattered to give me room! loads of fun when they were all standing on the runway with their backs to me! 5' over their head at 130kts definetly got their attention!🙃

Cliff

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[Scott Fletcher]

Electric car horns pull a lot more current that you would think. A much more robust current demand than most glider electrical systems are prepared for.  Small boat horn on a can, or the low pass seem like the best idea.  I bet the whistle on the landing gear would survive two flights before you removed it.

You know those systems where you click the mic three times and the runway lights come on, get one of those hook it to a train horn on your hangar and a 3" fireworks mortar shell.  Bet you meet the HOA after that goes off a few times.

SF

On Monday, February 2, 2026 at 9:38:57 AM UTC-5 kevin anderson wrote:

[Charles Mampe]

Absolutely epic solution. Might have to do that at our field.

;-)

[Michael Opitz]

To show that this issue is a pretty old one I am attaching a picture of a page from my father's old photo album

from 90 years ago.  During the 1936 Rhön glider contest at the Wasserkuppe in Germany some spectators had driven 

a convertible car around the ropes meant to keep the public at bay, and they had gotten right onto the flight operations 

area.  One guy was sitting on top of the "top down" folded car roof with his feet on the car's back seat so that he could 

see better.  IIRC, they had the car pointed uphill so that they could observe the bungee cord launches going down the hill 

towards them.  This meant that they weren't looking behind them for landing traffic which went uphill.  My father came 

around the ridge, turned uphill to line up for his landing, and found this car right in the middle of the landing area.  My father 

tried to raise his wing to avoid the car, but couldn't raise it high enough to avoid hitting the guy seated on top of the back 

seat (in the back of the guy's head head).  They took the guy off to the hospital, and IIRC my father lost a contest day while 

he repaired the damage to the glider.  Not too long afterwards, my father received this poem accompanied by a bicycle horn

with rubber squeeze bulb from the surgeon that attended to the injured guy.  It basically says don't put this horn in your study,

but attach this horn to your crate so that everyone will make a wide detour around you when you come in to land.  I guess the 

man's injuries weren't too bad, and the spectators were found to have been in a prohibited area, so my father didn't get into any 

trouble over the incident.

Mike Opitz

RO

[kevin anderson]

Thanks for all the thoughts.  A mini air horn may be best for me.  I was hoping to have something electric where I would not have to take my hand off the spoilers, but the mini air horn probably gets it. 

Kevin

[Charles Mampe]

Left hand pattern, hit the horn on downwind. If need be, again on final.

[Kevin Anderson]

like it

hope you are doing well.

Steve Vihlen that lives down the runway came and helped me could outer wing holders.  Love them, makes it so simple. 

92

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[Sean Franke]

HpH has that option on new gliders. It may be retrofittable.

[Dave Nadler]

On Monday, February 2, 2026 at 9:38:57 AM UTC-5 kevin anderson wrote:

...I am looking for gear horn ideas. 

How about a hole tone whistle (teapot whistle) in the aft spoiler panel?
Anybody up for designing it?
Or has it been done already?

 

[kevin anderson]

Cool idea Dave

92

Sent from my iPhone

On Feb 9, 2026, at 4:46 PM, Dave Nadler <d...@nadler.com> wrote:



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[Dave Nadler]

Or just plug the inlet holes and screw one of these on the back of the spoiler panel,
and drill two small holes through the panel into the intake manifold.
https://www.amazon.com/TENOC-Emergency-Survival-Whistles-Aluminum/dp/B0G42BKHS4
Test mounting and hole placement on a scrap before assaulting the glider ;-)

[kevin anderson]

Thanks Sean,

Kevin

[Stéphane Vander Veken]

Dr. Justus Schneider seems to have played quite an important role for the safety of gliding, having treated lots of wounds from sailplane crashes. According to Peter Riedel, citing Wolfgang Späte, he was instrumental in providing a sprung pedal system, a better seat profile and broader safety belts for the primary gliders of the period, so reducing the occurence of talus bone fractures, spinal fractures and liver wounds. He also found the right treatment for Heini Dittmar who had been severely wounded (undetected spinal injury) in a landing accident with a Me-163...

Concerning the "gear horn" idea, I seem to remember there was an accident many years ago, when a glider pilot, having to make an outlanding on a frozen lake, saw a group of ice skaters crossing his landing path. Having no way to warn them, he tried to avoid them, lost control of the glider and was killed in the subsequent crash. If somebody remembers in what issue of Soaring this was published? Must have been in the seventies, I think. The idea of a kind of warning horn was a suggestion at the time also.