Soviet KGB Phone - Wiring For Home Use In US

[NationsAttic]

Hello everyone. I recently purchased a old phone that was apparently made in 1964 in the Soviet union called a wall Carbolite. I was also told it was used in a KGB building, but who knows. I would really love to use this phone in my home office (I'm in the United States) and was hoping someone may be able to lead me in the right direction in terms of wiring it for a standard US wall jack.

I have attached some photos of how it is currently wired. I was told it worked just fine in Russia, so I'm hoping it's just a mater of putting the correct wires in line with a wall plug jack.

For the home, we use Cox Communications and a old rotary dial pay phone works on the system currently, so I hope the dial on this one will as well.

Thanks everyone!

Don

[dsk]

Hi Don
Welcome to the forum.
The Russian phone should work well in US, It may have some high ringer load, this may be a problem if used together with other telephones on the same line, but that is solvable if it cause trouble.

Nice pictures!

Typical terminal 1 and 2 connects to line. (red and white) polarity does not matter.

The third wire could be isolated (taped).

So go on and try 

dsk

[NationsAttic]

Thank you. I just tried hooking a one wire to terminal 1 and another to terminal 2, nothing. I tried different combinations of the four wires and still nothing. I have kept the green wire isolated. I'm assuming it doesn't mater which color of wire I'm hooking up to each terminal?

Thank you again!

Don

[NationsAttic]

Update - got the phone taking incoming and outgoing calls, but no ring on incoming calls. I would assume I need to now focus on the internal wiring and not the two terminals? Thanks! Don

[Contempra]

what is the model don ?....the name of this phone too will help us for finding a wiring diagram if it exists.

[NationsAttic]

I believe it is called a Carbolite and it has 1964 on bottom. That's about it in terms of any names or markings. I will double check the inside in a few minutes.

[Contempra]

I believe it is called a Carbolite and it has 1964 on bottom. That's about it in terms of any names or markings. I will double check the inside in a few minutes.

I don't know if this can help you  http://www.telephonecollectors.info/index.php/component/docman/doc_details/4547-russian-t13-1952?Itemid=101 but I don't know I don't read russian. check it ...

[dsk]

Update - got the phone taking incoming and outgoing calls, but no ring on incoming calls. I would assume I need to now focus on the internal wiring and not the two terminals? Thanks! Don

Great, usually the ringer needs a connection between 2 terminals close to each other. Since 1 and 2 are for the line, you may start with a connection between 2 and 3.   

Iguess you  will end up with a circuit pretty close to the left one here:
Since the Dial has only 3 wires, The right wire on the dial are probably not there.

dsk

[NationsAttic]

GOT IT WORKING! Thank you everyone for your help. Now with this phone both the NSA and KGB can listen in.

[Matilo Telephones]

Very interesting Phone. Glad you got it working. Do you know what that writing on the dial says?

[dsk]

GOT IT WORKING! Thank you everyone for your help. Now with this phone both the NSA and KGB can listen in.

Congratulations!
Now you have to determine if you get ringer problems, this telephone will use about 2-2.5 the load of a typical US telephone. The next may be if you have really much nose from the transmitter-element.  I non of these are a problem, you really have a nice working phone.

Regarding the KGB and NCA listening, I am pretty sure the modern surveillance software makes it possible to do so. They recognize sudden words like nine eleven and al-Qaida and may manually listen in and determine if this may be a risk.  (so my guess are this message will be monitored, especially when it comes from another country)  In one way, I am happy for this, in another way, I like people to trust me.

dsk

[NationsAttic]

Very interesting Phone. Glad you got it working. Do you know what that writing on the dial says?

Thanks. I was told it says "Talks on closed questions are forbidden" . Other than the design, that is what really sold it for me. I'm a James Bond fan, so this cold war stuff really is up my alley.