The ivory ones aren't as common and are worth a lot more than 40 quid now even in non working condition... they go for hundreds.
Telephone repair
- Thread starter Retro6
- Start date
There was one I used to watch called A1 Telephone repairs or something along those lines.
All these old phones will be retired once the landlines all change over from analog. I suspect you'll be able to get some kinda converter for them in the future made by old telephone hobbyists.
Soldato
I have got one like that. 1942. In a box at mo. Works fine.
Commissario
Yup
Not so much the voltage but the pulse, they knew they needed the emergency number to be one you could dial in the dark or by touch if needed, and they knew that the obvious option of 111 would be triggered regularly by the most common line faults, so they went with the other end of the dial at 999 which took longer to ring but was virtually impossible to be replicated by a fault.
The US did 911 which was a better than 111, and faster to dial than 999 but it was also harder to do in the dark as you had to find the correct places twice (999 and 111 you could let your finger track the dial as it rotated back so only had to find it once).
IIRC you can already get pulse to tone dial converters, as some phones from about 10 years either side of the changeover had the option to be set to one or the other and IIRC they continued to be produced for a fairly long time because of smaller legacy building exchanges (PBX?) and some countries didn't swap over for a long time so it was cheaper to make the handsets that worked with both options.
I think there are already some hobbiest kits to convert even the 1920's era phones to be IP phones by basically having a circuit that listens to the pulses then sends them through an IP adaptor that is commercially available (I've got a feeling it's done with something like a pizero or similar doing the interfacing). I know I've seen people who have done it to make a "mobile" compatible antique set.
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Soldato
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I thought those BT Viscount phones had a pulse/tone selector switch on them.
We had an orange one, and an ivory one. I'm pretty sure they did them in green too.
We had an orange one, and an ivory one. I'm pretty sure they did them in green too.
Soldato
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Pretty sure they appeared in teh 80's BT used to actually sell phones and until deregulation you weren't allowed to buy a phone from anyone other than BT. Even that was a revelation as before that you had to rent the phone along with the line and it was one of those big old plastic things the only choice you had was the colour. Things you remember, tsk.
I remember those! Just about anyway pretty sure one of my parents early houses had one or my grandparents did there was a pullout tray infront with a piece of card you could jot down numbers on
Pulse dial. I can still mimic the sound they used make lol. And yes remember teh switchover, magic indeed. "You just press the digits and... thats it? You don't need to wait for the dials to go through? Amazing!"
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Soldato
With membranes, there are always two failures
1. flexible copper track erodes or cracks - you can test this easily with a multimeter or anything that measures resistance/conductivity, you can normally see the problem, either corrosion that erodes the track, or the cracks (often hairline), repairing is tricky, sometimes you can dig out through to the copper and solder across the crack/corrosion.
2. The conductive carbon on the bottom of the physical button erodes/cracks - this is more common, the membrane keypads generally work by the bottom of the button (or inbetween rubber structure) has a carbon (conductive) flexible paint on the tip, when that is pressed it shorts the two half pads together on the membrane.. These are repairable with conductive patches (https://www.ebay.co.uk/sch/i.html?_...13&_nkw=remote+control+button+repair&_sacat=0)
Soldato
Not sure where you live but around here they getting rid of analog lines all together. My isp keeps trying to get me to switch to full fibre to the prem, which I keep refusing as I don’t want them drilling holes in my house till I’m ready to redecorate. The number of people in my village who has switched to full fibre then moaned that their house phone no longer work.. lol
My parents just moved to a new build with just fibre in the whole estate so it’s a case of either a fibre phone line (voip) which is crazy expensive or what I got them, a household cellphone.
I’ve been looking at vintage casio watches with telememo and databank.. some have phone diallers built into them, if I recall correctly; there was individual phone diallers that you could hold against the microphone part of the phone which would dial numbers.
My parents just moved to a new build with just fibre in the whole estate so it’s a case of either a fibre phone line (voip) which is crazy expensive or what I got them, a household cellphone.
I’ve been looking at vintage casio watches with telememo and databank.. some have phone diallers built into them, if I recall correctly; there was individual phone diallers that you could hold against the microphone part of the phone which would dial numbers.
Soldato
My parents had a bright red one of those for many, many years until the changeover to pulse dialling.
Dull telecoms fact: many of the old telephone exchanges are now cell sites for multiple operators as they had plenty of room inside after all the electromechanical exchange cabinets were removed and planning permission for the masts was easy to obtain. That they were often in the middle of towns and cities was an added bonus.
Anytime you see a cell site with “ATE” in its name, it’s an old exchange building as it stands for Automatic Telephone Exchange.
Soldato
VoIP phones are great if live somewhere that never has power cuts and has good cellular service in case the house loses power. As I have both regular power outages and zero cellular coverage, I’m hanging on to my landline for as long as possible.
Haha, my folks did the same with the lock on the dial!
I was able to pick the lock though and that worked until one time I couldn't pick it to get it locked back on again lol I got into so much trouble
Underboss
I also have one of those wall mounted GPO phones in my kitchen that was working for years until one day it stopped working and I never got around to repairing it, I did have a quick look at it once but I never went too deep into it and left it. It hangs there now mostly for decoration but at some point I will get it going once again as its nice to hear it ring and quite handy having a telephone in the kitchen so I never have to run for the phone if there is one in each room. The GPO wall mounts are rare and quite valuable.
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I love the sound of those old bell sets ringing. I was thinking about making a doorbell out of a spare bell set. The bell sets run on 50volts to 75Volts AC at 25Hz so finding a power supply that can put out that voltage in AC wont be easy but I suppose I could always modify an old mains transformer to put out the voltage I need although the current will be 50Hz and not 25Hz but should be fine. I have an original early 1900s door bell push button.
Commissario
You didn't need to pick the lock on a dial phone. You could tap the rest to replicate dial pulses, that was an easy way around it.I was able to pick the lock though and that worked until one time I couldn't pick it to get it locked back on again lol I got into so much trouble
Why would it be worth money? and how would you transfer the number to someone anywayI remember the rotary dials tooIn fact, i also remember my telephone number from the 80's - 606789. I wonder how much that number would be worth now?
Sometimes old phone numbers can be re-used.
Man of Honour
Funnily enough this just popped up on my FBee:
Soldato
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503659 was the number I had growing up its the one number I can always remember its even more imprinted than the current number here which i have to think about for a moment. I've tried dialling it on occasion to see if anyone would answer but its just number unobtainableI remember the rotary dials too