Date : Tue, 23 Mar 2010 14:43:25 -0500
From : jules.richardson99@... (Jules Richardson)
Subject: [OT] ADSL capabilities
Mike Tomlinson wrote:
> In article <4BA8AFB4.2020703@...>, Jules Richardson
> <jules.richardson99@...> writes
>
>> I've got an old black 1940's GPO phone that I'd like to hook up sometime
>
> Very easy. You need a cable with a BT plug at one end and spade
> terminals on the other, as shown here
In the US, though? I know I can do that in the UK - I had my old 706-type
phone hooked up there (that those certainly were common in skips 10-20 years
ago!). I'm not sure how different the US system is (and if it even supports
pulse dialing these days).
Unfortunately I've never found any good US vintage phone resources where I can
ask (unlike the UK, where there are some excellent ones).
> They were very common 10-20 years ago, particularly when the new-style
> socket was introduced in 1981 and people were converting their old
> phones, but they seem hard to find now.
706's and trimphones, certainly - I don't remember seeing much of the older
stuff around then, but maybe I just wasn't looking in the right places ;-)
Far as I understand, mine was originally on a private line, so I think it
might have the wrong guts to just work with a modern system (BT or otherwise)
- so regardless of how close the US system is to the UK, I may well be looking
at some "box of tricks" to get it to hook up anyway.
> Your phone may use the same terminal numbering system as the one in the
> photo above (I can't remember) If not, if the phone still has its
> original braided line cord connected, you want to connect the red and
> white wires of the new line cord to the same terminals as the old line
> cord.
Yeah, I had a cord (with the 'modern' plug and spade terminals at the other
end) culled from a junk phone and a nice little bakelite junction box, so the
plan was to use all that to attach the older phone's braided cord to the
modern sockets - I just never got the tuits together to see if it'd work :-)
cheers
Jules