ItsJustMe

I'm ready to put a horn on my bike. I am sold on the Airzound being really loud, but I ride year round and from what I understand, the Airzound doesn't really work in cold temps (below freezing for months at a time, sometimes below zero).

Then there's the Galeforce Blaster, which I'm sure would work in the cold, but I don't know how effective it is. People say it's pretty loud, but not as loud as the Airzound. The stuff I've seen on youtube sounds to me like it's not nearly as loud.

It says it'll work on a 6 volt source so I may be able to wire it to my Magicshine 7.4v pack. It says it's louder on a 12v battery than a 9v, but I don't know if that's due to voltage or current; a 12v SLA can generate way more current than a wimpy little 9v battery.

comments?

2_i 

For the sound signal to be effective, it needs to generate some immediate association. From what one can hear on the biketac.com site, the sound of the Blaster is going to be confusing. I put a moped horn on my bike and get a reasonable response. The horn itself cost me $3 or so, but my labor, as is common, well exceeded the cost of the Blaster.

colleen c

I was going to post a review on the Galeforce blaster in the community forum. I had my Galeforce for three weeks now and pretty much ready to post my impression, but you beat me to it, so I'll report what I got here.

If you have to get one horn only, get an Airzound. No second guessing. Here is what I experience. The Galforce is loud indoor. Using an Iphone db app, it is louder than an airzound by couple of Db, but outdoor is a different world. The higher pitch and freq of the Airzound is way way better. It is easier to pin point the location of the blast. While the blaster is not loud outdoor and seem to just spread out the sound with little distinction. The blaster is better if say you are on a MUP or sidewalk and want the pedestrian in front of ya to get out of the way without blowing out their ear drum or their baby eardrum in the stroller with the Airzound. I kept mine on the bike just for that use only and as backup if I ran out of air, which is no longer an issue with the bigger bottle.

9v is Ok. It does not last long and battery dies faster. 12v last longer but not any louder even with a SLA at 12v in hoping it was a current thing. 15v is better and more louder but still not enough for street use. I took the chance and voided the warranty by running double 9v in series for 18v. It is much louder than the 9v setup, yet the freq and tone is nowhere near as effective as the Airzound. So far I ran two weeks with the 18v setup with no damage to the voice coil yet......

Get an Airzound first for traffic than a Galeforce Blaster for Pedestrian for thing like trail use. I have not tried the other Galeforce Siren which has the siren tone and the Blaster tone, but from what I heard, that tone sound more like a car alarm than a police siren and we know how much most people ignore car alarm tone.

ItsJustMe

Thanks folks. That matches my expectations. I also wondered about the non horn-like sound of the Galeforce. It seems to me that it's a weird sound and doesn't trigger the instant "oh, crap" slam on the brakes panic that you want. If I heard something like that while driving I'd continue along but start rubbernecking in the mirrors for the source.

colleen c

That pretty much sums up the Galeforce Blaster. When I uses it, it radiate sound everywhere and very hard to tell where it comes from. My horn is mounted on the rack by my pannier and it sound like it came from the front. I can be in the blind spot of a truck at the rear passenger side quarter panel and hit the Blaster and the driver will just tries to figure out where the source located from. Much different with Airzound. They will turn their head right at where I am while slowing down.

In the other side of the coin, I will not use an Airzound behind a 80 year old Grandma with all these lawyer around these days. Beside, I hate having to pick up their denture off the ground for them