Horn wire creates a short

[enthuzed]

Haven't looked into this properly yet but I was wondering if anyone has experienced this issue: When I touch the horn button wire onto the metal frame of the steering wheel I get a nice spark and then the wire for the horn gets hot very quickly & I can see by the interior lights that it's drawing some serious current.
I found the wire not connected with tape over it (for good reason). It's the standard steering wheel at the moment & both horns are mounted under the pop ups.
Any ideas?

[coop1er]

Faulty horn? Check that the fuse is the right amperage too.

[enthuzed]

It's a 20a fuse which is right & seems ok to me.
Without the fuse there's no power so it proves that someone hasn't been hacking at the circuit. I could try some different horns.
Maybe the problem will go away when I swap the wheel for a sports one, perhaps the factory wheel is creating the issue somehow...

[djalpha]

Short to earth. That wire to the horn is an earth wire. The horn itself already has power going to it. So when u press the horn u are completing the circuit. Somewhere along that earth line you have a source of postive power touching the wire. I'm pretty sure that earth wire is attached to the steering column which is obviously connected to the body. There maybe a power wire rubbing on the column. My 2 cents. Really need to be there with a multi meter.

[enthuzed]

Good point DJAlpha. I'll have to investigate with a multimeter in hand.

[Alspos]

Check if one of the horns is stuffed (there's 2 isn't there, haven't looked for a while) Disconnect one and try, if it works disconnect the other one and see which one's the issue. If it's stuffed and hard to get it to start honking there's your problem.

[enthuzed]

Is there anything worse than when you can't honk your own horn? LOL
There is two horns Al, I planned on trying that too before going nuts through the wiring loom.

[Adriano]

Is there a horn relay?

[enthuzed]

Not sure, never had to fix the horn before!