On this morning’s club ride, we were crossing a major U.S. highway. The light was in our favor, and cross traffic was stopped. All except one guy, that is. He was turning right from the highway onto the road we were taking, and didn’t stop for the red light.
My friend Joe, who has already been hit by cars twice, hollered at the top of his lungs for the driver to stop, and got his attention. It was clear the driver didn’t want to stop, especially for a half-dozen scruffy cyclists, but when the rest of us joined in with the yell, he hit his brakes and came up short of Joe.
It made me think of an email I got during the week, from an inventor who thinks he has the answer to prevent close calls like this: a car horn for bikes.

The concept is simple. Just mount a horn on your bike that has the same loudness as a car horn. Not only that, it has the same sound as a car horn. The inventor, Jonathan Lansey, is looking for funding to get the horn into production. He’s got a Kickstarter site with more details about the horn, and is soliciting donations.
I won’t weigh in either way on this one. I normally do not publicize commercial products on this blog, but the Loud Bicycle Horn is something different, and I thought I’d at least let Bike Noob readers get a look at it.
I’ve been wanting to mount a 6 Volt or 12 Volt Volkswagen Beetle horn to my bike. Loud enough and easily mountable.
Something along the lines of this:
https://www.google.com/search?q=6+volt+beetle+horn&hl=en&prmd=imvnsfd&bav=on.2,or.r_gc.r_pw.r_cp.r_qf.&bpcl=39650382&ion=1&biw=1345&bih=894&um=1&ie=UTF-8&tbm=isch&source=og&sa=N&tab=fi&ei=iuTFUNLOM4TE0AG274GADg
And not just for cars – but very effective against dogs – stops them in their tracks and gives you those precious couple of seconds to make a run for it – currently we use small air horns – definitely backing this up 😀
This is what we are currently using on our bikes – not very environmental-friendly, but it has saved our bicycles and plenty of pooches from getting run over on the roads
Forgot the link 😀
http://www.amazon.com/Air-Horn-987587/dp/B002TR0JEO