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My "new" AE 86-55 in original out of service condition and some questions

Started by Haf, June 25, 2013, 01:15:02 PM

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Haf

Here's some pics of my recent payphone an semi postpaid AE 86-55 in as out of service condition and dated on several parts 10 11 53. So it's a quite early one with the new design I think. Bought it on ebay as one of those mysterious left-hander phones:  http://tinyurl.com/podm4x8  but the seller did an awesome job in packing and shipping the phone secure to Germany. It has no keys so what was inside was a surprise when buying it but luckily everything was there and even no coinbox, so was able to unscrew the vault door lock from the back.
And I even got an unexpected "refund", the coin chute was stuffed and stuck with Quarters and Dimes and one Canadian coin too, someone must have made quite an effort to get them all in there. Most from the 1970's only three from 1980's and the newest from 1983.
And the handset looks like the plastic ones but is made from bakelite and quite heavy.

Now my questions, is it somehow possible to run a semi postpaid payphone with some kind of controller? I tried the one from Stan Schreier but it didn't work well as there is no return, you have to drop in a coin if the other party answers and it's collected right away and activates the transmitter. To me it would be sad destroying the originality by rewiring it into an LPC 82-55 prepay phone. But maybe any one here has an idea. Would be great.

And does anyone have scan of an nice ad for the top flag sign?

And I don't know if I'm right with that but I did some research on the internet with the phone number and the hint of North Dakota on the back of what it's in the top flag sign at the moment and it leaded me to this:

http://members.virtualtourist.com/m/p/m/21d547/

Will write the owner a mail and ask if this place has the same phone number for longer and if he knows something about the phone. And ask the seller too of course.
Telephone:
0049-030-55474418
1-415-449-4743
1-604-757-7474

DavePEI

Pull off the relay cover, so we can see what is in it in the way of a coin relay....

Dave
The Telephone Museum of Prince Edward Island:
http://www.islandregister.com/phones/museum.html
Free Admission - Call (902) 651-2762 to arrange a visit!
C*NET 1-651-0001

Haf

here you are,

first picture is coin relay before inserting a coin, dialing is always possible and you can hear the other party but transmitter is disabled.

second picture is coin relay after inserting a coin which is collected then immediately and the transmitter is enabled now.

picture from aside of the coin relay.

Sorry for the poor quality. But you can see that different from a prepay phone this ones doesn't hold the inserted coin because there is no need as you only insert a coin when the other party answers to enable the transmitter (and hope you're fast enough before the other hang up again, as you can't tell him to wait ;)

When you're done and hang up the bridge of the relay is pulled from the left coil and then from the right one and is ready for next call.
Telephone:
0049-030-55474418
1-415-449-4743
1-604-757-7474

AE_Collector

I have never seen a plastic cover like that in a 3 slot phone. That is interesting! AE and WE introduced their 80 and 500 type phones with covers on the hook switch pile up and the backs of dials etc so this must be the Payphone version of that for he coin relay. It is a good idea because believe me, coins fall out of their tracks and into electrical components in pay phones quite regularly.

I once went to a repair on a "noisy" AE single slot once to find that its coin acceptor didn't care for dimes. It spit out every dime out the side of the acceptor and the bottom of the upper housing was an inch or two deep in nothing but dimes which of course were putting a partial ground onto the phone line.

Terry

rdelius

Cant be 1953, must mean something else.That backboard and coin vault cannot date that early Made in Northlake .Moved from Chicago about 1956.Backboard LPC series has holes for the terminal strip.Not sure if the year but must have at least mid-late 60s because of the circuit boards are similar to the later type 80 sets without the reostat.Still an nice set though.If any part has the GTE logo instead of the AECO logo the part could be 1970s.

AE_Collector

What does the oronge numbering say?  10 71 53? If so most likely October 1971 with the 53 representing a plant or shift....like other AE coding of that time frame.

Terry

poplar1

Here is how the phone originally worked:

When you remove the handset, you hear dial tone, then dial the 7-digit directory number. When the party answers, the central office reverses battery (the polarity of the line), which activates the coin relay and shunts out the receiver so that you can no longer hear. Depositing two nickels, a dime (or even a quarter) removes the shunt so that you can hear and talk.

If there is no answer or if the line is busy, then the battery does not reverse--the polarity stays the same. Also, if you call the operator, the polarity stays the same; so you don't have to deposit 10 cents to talk to the operator.

Originally, these semi-postpay phones would work--and require coins--on a residential line without any rewiring. That is because reverse battery on answer was on all lines.* Semi-post pay phone lines would give a special class of service tone to the operator when she answered; so she would know you were calling from a pay phone. But there was no other expensive equipment in the central office such as the kind required for prepay phones.

So, first check with your local phone company to see if "reverse battery supervision" is available on your line. It may be offered as an option. (Unfortunately, none of the service representatives at AT&T knows what that means.)

If not available, then you can design a controller that will either
(a) provide reverse battery when the party answers,
(b) reverse battery after a certain time, such as 60 seconds
(c) reverse battery to the phone after detecting conversation.

*Some of you may remember that when making a call from a Touch-Tone phone, once the party answered, you could no longer produce tones with the dial, rather it would just click. That is why the solution to a Touch-Tone phone that won't dial out is to reverse the polarity (red and green incoming wires).

"C'est pas une restauration, c'est une rénovation."--François Martin.

Haf

Many thanks for your answers,

rdelius and AE_Collector, I think you're absolutely right, I was wondering myself if this could be a 1953 date. But it's nice to have a phone only 3 month younger than me and it's nothing considered to be rare (OK, here in Germany it is probably) so I decided to give it a good clean, copied an old Castrol/Mustang ad for the top flag sign and convert it into an LPC 82-55 to work with Stan's controller. Now it's like left the factory like this, all original housing with same date and I did my best making it look like professional wired again ;)

I will keep the coin relay from the LPC 86-55 for a later project making a controller for. As poplar1 suggested I think method (a) will be the best one as with method (b) for e.g. you could have the problem that if the other party answers your call quick  and you have to wait for a certain amount of seconds, the other one hangs up after the 3rd "hello" with nobody answering :)

Only thing I'm missing is the cap to protect the coin relay and a nicer looking bakelite handset with untwisted cord :)
If anyone has something around I will be pleased if you make me an offer.
Telephone:
0049-030-55474418
1-415-449-4743
1-604-757-7474

Haf

Stan Schreier did send me a scan of an article written for the TCI newsletter by Bruce Crawford  about a semi postpay controller Stan once build. Maybe it's from interest here :)

After all I think I made the right decision converting the payphone from semi postpay to prepay.

Haf
Telephone:
0049-030-55474418
1-415-449-4743
1-604-757-7474