Horn etiquette is pretty bad these days. Most people just lay on the horn and scare the crap out of everyone else on the road—this is not cool, so YouTuber Mark Rober devised a contraption that nice-ifies the horn-beeping process. Here’s what he did.
As rapper Lil B explained, basic horn etiquette works like this: two short back-to-back beeps means you’re in a good mood, a single beep is still fairly pleasant, and a one or two second honk means you’re ready to fight.
The problem is that today’s horns are hard to modulate. It’s difficult to press the button without looking like a jerk. That’s why Mark Rober installed a new horn with “courtesy honk” and “one notch nicer than courtesy honk” buttons. Here’s how it works:
Rober also put in a ridiculous air horn, because everyone needs one of those. His buttons are actually fairly well integrated into the dashboard, though the total systems are a bit chunky, requiring an entirely new horn and amp for the two “nice” honks, and another horn with a compressor for the air horn. Since his Jetta already comes with two horns from the factory, he’s driving around with a total of four. That seems slightly like overkill.
But if packaging four horns is what it takes to add a bit of niceness to this world, I guess I’m OK with that.