The manual GPO 706F and its guts...

[twocvbloke]

Well, I've been messing about with this off and on today (had little sleep so my mind keeps finding other things to do), but overall I'm impressed as to how well it's held up over the years...

I've been trying to find a date on it, and I was looking through the pictures I've taken, and the first one (with the peeled-off tape covering an old inspection label) I notice a very faint remnants of a stamp, and looking carefully, it says "706L PL 61/2", so according to British Telephones, it was made by "The Plessey Co. Ltd. - Ilford, Essex (later PLA)", and once upon a time it used to have an all-figures dial and/or bezel before being converted to a manual service phone...

The carrying handle, as already mentioned before, broke on me, thankfully not whilst carrying the phone, but whilst trying to reassemble it, I'm just waiting on the glue to cure for that, but I can see why the GPO figured that it'd be a safer bet to cast the handle as part of the shell on the 746, than having a separate and rather thin plastic piece that can easily break...

I did find something surprising, and even in the photos I didn't notice it, the blanking cap that goes where the Recall switch is located was clipped to the hookswitch frame, so if need be I can actually remove the switch and refit the blank...

One thing that makes me wonder is why it has a load of paint slopped about on the inside of the case, unless something was pasted there and later removed or something....

Anyway, there's not much to this phone, can't dial out being dial-less, it rings, it has clear speech and reception, and is pretty much all working in it's unconverted state, and my custom-made BT52A with RJ11 socket works nicely with it, all I need now is my Panasonic system and I can start calling myself on other phones...

But for now, pictures...  

[twocvbloke]

And the guts pictures:

[Owain]

Here's a similar one which shows a correct dial label for a CB non-Auto phone

EBAY

[twocvbloke]

I was looking at that one earlier as I noticed it doesn't have the carry handle, so I was trying to work out how it's case was being held on, but the pictures aren't clear enough...

The dial label is interesting though, I'll have to see if I can mock one up for the 706, I just used that one above (borrowed from my spares 746) to make it look "complete", that label has someone's possibly active number scrawled on it hence me disguising it as it doesn't belong to me...

[Owain]

The case is held on with two fixing screws (Part 1/DSC/100). passing through through bushes (Part 1/DBU/282) with escutcheon plates (Parts 1 and 2/DPL/746 left and right respectively) where there is no  handle (Part 1/DHA/23 Colour).


from Sam Hallas

[twocvbloke]

Ah, I see now...

[twocvbloke]

I just noticed that the Brown dial wire (which connects to the "D3" point on the PCB) is missing, I was wondering why there was only 4 wires...

Still, looking at the diagram, it's not required like the Blue and Slate wires, although they're still there...

Just neatened up the insulating of the Blue & slate wires though, the terminals T11 thru T14 are "Spare", so are useful for insulating unwanted or unused wires, so I connected them up to T12 and T13 after shuffling the Orange & Pink wires up to T14, just so it's all neat...

[twocvbloke]

Some more pictures, the three black phones I have (NE2500, WE500, and GPO706), a 500 vs. 706 size comparison, and the neatened up wiring mentioned in the prev. post...

[gpo706]

The carrying handles are massively under-engineered, with the thinness and the aged brittleness of them I have had two snap just on a slight lift test, I replace them with the chrome retaining plates, or better still a chrome handle.

That's a neat trick of the engineer who converted the set to clip the old blanking button on the frame, very clever, never had any such a lucky find on my 706's.

You have to get the screws on the chromed bits quite carefully, takes a lot of fiddling to get them to bed in properly, you go back and forth from one to the other getting a tight fit, if you tighten one down first the other inevitably won't want to sit, and a slight protrusion will scratch your handset.

The chrome handgrabs add a bit of "pimp my phone" to a plain looking case.

(Apologies for the poor pic, was taken on my mobile in near darkness).

[twocvbloke]

While I was waiting for the auction to finish, I was looking at one of those on ebay, but I can't seem to find it now, so it's either sold or I haven't a clue what terms to search for!!!

I do recall it being a bit over-priced (in my opinion) though, for such a small piece of shiny metal and all...

[gpo706]

They are quite over-priced, as are the wall conversion variants maybe due to their rarity,a trawl through "GPO 706" might throw some interesting bits and bobs up though.

You really don't need one if you leave the 706 on the desk, just get some chrome escutcheons.

Oh and BTW you can hookset flash it through your Pana to ring another extension.

[twocvbloke]

I saw one of the wall conversion ones the other day, and thought that one would be cool to have, as this 706 is a dialless version, it'd be handy as a basic wallphone...

Well, the glue didn't hold, so, I definitely need either a handle or the escutcheons for it, as for now the broken off ends are holding the case down, which doesn't look to pretty...

Ah the joys of old phones eh? 

[david@london]

the wiring diagram would have been pasted inside the case........my 706 has that but it fell off so i stuck it back w/ pritt stik........underneath was the same copydex painty looking glue.

i bought a plastic carrying handle for mine........it was a modern copy & so flimsy it busted while i was installing it. luckily the seller replaced it for me with an original plastic one...........still a bit bendy but much better.

i remember the plessey factory in ilford. i used to live near there. we also had 'ilford' films....very good b&w 35mm.

[twocvbloke]

I was beginning to winder if the white stuff was a glue of somesort, I was thinking it was someone who had altered the phone and stuck the removed parts to the side of the case or something, but, the diagram would be a better thing to stick there!!!

I've just been toying with the idea of using the recall button as a rudimentary hookswitch flash button, trying different connection ideas, I've worked it out now, but I'm not 100% sure it's "right", need that Panasonic system to get here so I can try it out!!

[gpo706]

Well you might be able to use the recall button to get dial tone on hook, but you would then need to remove the handset to flash the hook?