First, thanks to Dennis and Dave from PEI for letting me join.
I stumbled on this a while back. Northern did make these, but it was a tinted transparent plastic called "smoke", not totally clear, and they were only given to employees. Does anyone know who won this one? It must have come from the Nashville plant.
It has an eastern NC area code (919) on it. I'm in NC and I'd like to see the auction. Do you have the auction link and could you post it? Or the eBay item number? I hadn't seen it until now.
Welcome to the Forum!
Nothhern Telecom had a large plant in RTP (Raleigh) .Carolina Telephone (United Telephone) in Eastern NC used large quanities of Contempra sets.Both 919 AC.
Welcome Dominic!
I have never seen a clear contempra before. That would be a nice addition to my collection.
Jim S.
Welcome to the forum! I believe I've seen you around on Dave's Museum Facebook page, correct?
That's an interesting set. It's possible that it could be a reproduction, but because I've never seen one like this before, I doubt it.
Quote from: Dominic_ContempraPhones on September 23, 2015, 12:57:35 AM
I stumbled on this a while back. Northern did make these, but it was a tinted transparent plastic called "smoke", not totally clear, and they were only given to employees. Does anyone know who won this one?
Isn't Dominic saying he saw this some time ago in an auction of some sort and is asking if anyone knows who won that auction? I might be wrong in my understanding, something he can clear up when he checks back in.
Thanks everyone -- sorry for the late response.
The eBay auction URL was: http://www.ebay.com/itm/291255877961 -- went for $150.
Attached is another shot. I actually saw it on this forum here:
http://www.classicrotaryphones.com/forum/index.php?topic=12431.msg134703#msg134703
It looks totally legit. I heard that Northern's John F. Tyson (its designer), is the only other person who had one, and that's it.
I have one new in the box that was given to me, but it's tinted clear, not fully clear like this, and it's not DTMF. They called it "smoke", but it's their pulse emulator model (DIGIPULSE) - QSK3100AX -- but not the ones I remember. It had a soft dial (not the hinged "chu" click dial), and it chimes at the end of the pulse sequence, or whenever it catches up to you.
I was just wondering who got this clear DTMF one. I contacted the seller to see if they worked for Northern, but they didn't answer. You don't see one of these very often, if at all.
Dominic
According to Terry Biddlecombe's latest eBay handles list, which is three years old, the winner could be Dick Capon in Florida, but there's no email address. His full eBay handle is we302w, so you could try sending him a message through eBay and ask if he's the winner. Our own Dave Willingham, aka Poplar1, was, I think, the runner up.
The phone was installed in Raleigh because that's a Raleigh, NC phone number on it, and the seller was in Raleigh too.
Thanks for the info jsowers! No luck I'm afraid -- I did a search on we302w and nothing came up I'm afraid. I also tried looking him up as a seller for close matches and nothing came up either. He does seem to bid on a lot of phones when I look at his bidding profile though. Poplar1 -- is he guy I sold that pink card dialer to last year? -- attached below. Maybe I'll ask him. Thanks anyway -- much appreciated.
Quote from: Dominic_ContempraPhones on September 25, 2015, 05:53:34 PM
<snip>... is he guy I sold that pink card dialer to last year? ...
No, Dominic, I'm the one who bought your pink Card Dialer -- Absolutely one of the coolest phones in my collection!
Dave F.
Hi Dave -- a few people told me they were blown away by it. You made a lot of people envious. Anyways, I'm glad it found a good home. I never used it because I don't have a key system in my home. I always wondered if someone had the idea to build a small box emulator that could mimic one -- ie. amphenol in on one side -- 5 RJ11s on the other side, and a transformer into the box for power. That way, you can test it in a standalone mode, even with a single line.
I saw that card dialer and thought; "Man, Dave F would love that thing!". I guess he loves it more than I thought...
Dave, on a side note, how many colors have you seen/do you have the Card Dialer in? From you, I've seen Gray, Green, Turquoise, and Pink.
Quote from: Dominic_ContempraPhones on September 25, 2015, 07:51:33 PM
Hi Dave -- a few people told me they were blown away by it. You made a lot of people envious. Anyways, I'm glad it found a good home. I never used it because I don't have a key system in my home. I always wondered if someone had the idea to build a small box emulator that could mimic one -- ie. amphenol in on one side -- 5 RJ11s on the other side, and a transformer into the box for power. That way, you can test it in a standalone mode, even with a single line.
Dominic,
You definitely found it a good and appreciative home! I'm still amazed every time I look at it. You know, there are only two pink Card Dialers known to exist: This one, and the one in the JKL museum. I know they had several hours before the fire to remove the rarest stuff -- I sure hope that their pink Card Dialer was one of the lucky survivors.
Back in June, I took mine to the So. Cal. phone show and included it in the pink display set up by our mutual friend Steve H. I think that display was the star of the show -- we certainly got plenty of attention. It was a lot of fun.
I don't currently have a key system operating, but I have squirreled away all the stuff needed to build a nice old 1A1 system. In fact, at long-last, I recently found a very rare 247A KTU (not to be confused with the common 247B later version), the original Touchtone converter for dial intercoms. If I ever have the time to work on it, I'll spend many happy hours wiring up all those old 200-series KTUs!
DF
Quote from: WEBellSystemChristian on September 25, 2015, 10:36:11 PM
I saw that card dialer and thought; "Man, Dave F would love that thing!". I guess he loves it more than I thought...
Dave, on a side note, how many colors have you seen/do you have the Card Dialer in? From you, I've seen Gray, Green, Turquoise, and Pink.
I currently have Card Dialers in all colors except yellow and blue. While these two colors are toughies, they are surely no match for pink or turquoise in terms of rarity. If anybody hears of a blue or yellow for sale, please let me know.
By the way, I recently found a Card Dialer in Ivory. This is a color far rarer than you might expect.
DF
Blue ... like this?
I sold JKL a new old stock yellow 711 princess from 1961, which got the white glove treatment from me and its previous owner, not even knowing they were the ones who kept outbidding me back then on rare items that are now gone. I still can't figure out what happened there. I'm hearing rumours the collection wasn't even insured -- never mind you can't even replace that stuff.
Quote from: Dominic_ContempraPhones on September 26, 2015, 12:40:31 AM
Blue ... like this?
Dominic,
Yes, that would do it. You still have my email address? Contact me and let's see what we can do.
Dave
Quote from: Dominic_ContempraPhones on September 26, 2015, 12:44:31 AM
I sold JKL a new old stock yellow 711 princess from 1961, which got the white glove treatment from me and its previous owner, not even knowing they were the ones who kept outbidding me back then on rare items that are now gone. I still can't figure out what happened there. I'm hearing rumours the collection wasn't even insured -- never mind you can't even replace that stuff.
John is certainly a voracious competitor. His deep pockets allow him to win most (but happily not all) the auctions he goes after. If he does actually rebuild the museum, we can expect to see much more of him as he tries to restore what was lost.
I don't know anything about his insurance, but I bet they managed to rescue much of the one-of-a-kind stuff before the fire. Because many of those items are essentially irreplaceable, if too much was lost it would not be feasible to duplicate the collection even if the museum building was rebuilt. It will be interesting to see what happens next.
DF
Hi Dave,
The blue card dialer isn't mine I'm afraid, but I have a black 10-button card dialer. The blue was on eBay recently and I missed it. I didn't get an alert.
Quote from: Dominic_ContempraPhones on September 26, 2015, 05:13:36 PM
Hi Dave,
The blue card dialer isn't mine I'm afraid, but I have a black 10-button card dialer. The blue was on eBay recently and I missed it. I didn't get an alert.
Gee, that's too bad. I missed it also!
DF
You have an ansi card dialer ... when you punch stop does it insert a pause, or does the card actually stop? I also heard you don't have to punch the top field for 1, 2, 3, or a. Is that true?
Quote from: Dominic_ContempraPhones on September 26, 2015, 10:55:55 PM
You have an ansi card dialer ... when you punch stop does it insert a pause, or does the card actually stop? I also heard you don't have to punch the top field for 1, 2, 3, or a. Is that true?
I'm not familiar with the term "ansi".
DF
The one with the square holes.
Quote from: Dominic_ContempraPhones on September 26, 2015, 10:55:55 PM
You have an ansi card dialer ... when you punch stop does it insert a pause, or does the card actually stop? I also heard you don't have to punch the top field for 1, 2, 3, or a. Is that true?
For the benefit of others who may not know what we are discussing here, Dominic's questions refer to the prototype F58554 (and F58555) Card Dialers which use cards with the rectangular punch holes.
For more info, see the short discussion that starts here:
http://www.classicrotaryphones.com/forum/index.php?topic=7944.msg92192#msg92192
I don't have too many of the special cards that this phone uses, and I have not punched out any "stops". However, as the purpose of this feature is the same on this and all other Card Dialers, I would bet that doing so would cause the card to stop.
As to your other question: Yes, it's true that you don't have to punch the top field for 1, 2, 3, or a. The clever designers at Bell Labs realized that, with the proper application of logic circuitry, this could be accomplished. A standard touchtone dial has oscillators activated directly by switches - there is no logic circuitry involved. In that case, both sets of switches are required to produce the two tones. However, the TT dial in the F58554 Card Dialer is a new design that uses I.C. logic, rather than toroid-coil oscillators. The internal logic incorporated into the new dial makes it possible to accomplish the one-switch trick. In fact, the card reader in the F58554 doesn't even read the card's top field for 1, 2, 3, or a. It doesn't matter whether or not you punch them out, the phone doesn't care. It's really quite clever. This is an obscure tidbit of Card Dialer lore -- how did you hear about it?
DF
ANSI (American National Standards Institute) required a default, so my understanding is that row is "energized" by default. However, I interpreted the ANSI STOP as a 2-second pause because a STOP was always required in the other machines in column 1 to hold the card down after insertion. The ANSI cards have no stops punched in column 1 and do not require them -- is this correct?
On the old cards, say you wanted to dial *67 (pause) *70 (pause) to block caller ID and call waiting, followed by 555-2368. There would be a default stop punched on the * in column 1, but another stop would be punched under the 2nd * and again on the first 5. Pressing START would dial out * 6 7, and then the card would stop. You would have to press START to get it going again once your dialtone was steady again. After the *70, the card would stop again, and you'd have to press START a third time.
However, in the ANSI implementation there is no stop in column 1 (supposedly), and a stop instead inserts a 2-second pause without you having to press start again -- the card just rolls out and it goes into memory. I wanted someone who has the phone to test it and see if that behavior was implemented, or if the person has to press START a 2nd time and a 3rd time.
How do I know all this? I don't remember. I worked at Bell and Northern Telecom and I just remember hearing about it, or reading it somewhere there. It's just like the rotary card dialers -- did subsequent models require a punch in the lower field for 0? Has anyone tested it? The 10-button touch-tone models absolutely do need two punches for 0.
Quote from: Dominic_ContempraPhones on September 28, 2015, 07:42:11 PM
ANSI (American National Standards Institute) required a default, so my understanding is that row is "energized" by default. However, I interpreted the ANSI STOP as a 2-second pause because a STOP was always required in the other machines in column 1 to hold the card down after insertion. The ANSI cards have no stops punched in column 1 and do not require them -- is this correct?
On the old cards, say you wanted to dial *67 (pause) *70 (pause) to block caller ID and call waiting, followed by 555-2368. There would be a default stop punched on the * in column 1, but another stop would be punched under the 2nd * and again on the first 5. Pressing START would dial out * 6 7, and then the card would stop. You would have to press START to get it going again once your dialtone was steady again. After the *70, the card would stop again, and you'd have to press START a third time.
However, in the ANSI implementation there is no stop in column 1 (supposedly), and a stop instead inserts a 2-second pause without you having to press start again -- the card just rolls out and it goes into memory. I wanted someone who has the phone to test it and see if that behavior was implemented, or if the person has to press START a 2nd time and a 3rd time.
How do I know all this? I don't remember. I worked at Bell and Northern Telecom and I just remember hearing about it, or reading it somewhere there. It's just like the rotary card dialers -- did subsequent models require a punch in the lower field for 0? Has anyone tested it? The 10-button touch-tone models absolutely do need two punches for 0.
You are correct that there is no "stop" punched out in column 1 of the (ANSI) cards. Looking at the BSP for the F58554 (502-690-100), it is not entirely clear how it works.
Section 3.07: "If a stop is punched after the last telephone number digit, the R bar must be operated to release the card."
I interpret this to mean that the card actually stops in this case.
Section 3.08: "If a second dial tone is required, punch out the STOP in the appropriate row. Punching out the first STOP will result in a wait after the first digit."
The use of the word "wait" is ambiguous and does not tell us whether or not the card actually stops. If the card does not stop and the subsequent digits go temporarily into memory before being dialed, the dialer circuitry is more sophisticated than I would have guessed. The only way to really find out is to sacrifice some cards and do some tests. Eventually, I will probably do that but, like I said, I don't have a lot of cards to expend. (If you happen to have a few sacrificial cards that you would like to donate to the cause, I would be happy to play with them and give you a full report!)
As to the rotary Card Dialers, the original model 661 (with the 40A dialer mechanism) did not require a "0"punch in the lower field. Subsequent versions (with the redesigned 41A dial) may or may not require the "0"punch in the lower field. That should not be a difficult thing to test, assuming that somebody actually takes the time to test it! One clue, however, is that when the new sets were introduced, the cards were modified to indicate that both "0"s were required.
DF
Well, that was so they would be compatible on rotary and TT. TT needed both punches. The ANSI literature is unclear. The stop punch on the old machines is before, whereas on ANSI, it's after. If I wanted to dial *67 P *70 P 555 2368 ...
On an old machine, stops are punched on the *'s and the first 5
On an ANSI machine, stops are punched on the first 7 and the 0 and it just rolls out -- similar to Northern's digipulse memory buffer.
However, if you punched stop on a column and no other number was punched in that same column, then it would stop.
And for Pete's sake, they had mark sense card technology (pencil) by the early 70s. Why wasn't WE using those?
Anyways, test it and see what happens. I'm curious.
Quote from: Dominic_ContempraPhones on September 29, 2015, 03:04:04 AM
<snip> ...Well, that was so they would be compatible on rotary and TT. ...
That may or may not be true. The change made to those cards coincides with the release of the newer rotary-dial sets (660 & 662), but TT Card Dialers were not yet available. However, they might have been anticipating the TT sets and made the new rotary cards to be compatible. Or, the new 41A rotary card dialer mech simply needed both "0"s punched. All my Card Dialers are packed up. To do some rotary testing I would have to dig one out and then find where my 2012B/D transformers are hiding. If any other Forum members have a 660 or 662 Card Dialer in use, maybe they can do the "0" test and finally provide an answer. (See what the dialer does if you only punch out the "0" in the upper field of the card.)
As far as the ANSI set is concerned, I need to locate more cards before doing any card-destructive testing.
One additional detail (see photo below): The STOP punchouts on standard cards are in line with the other punchouts in their respective columns. On the ANSI cards, the STOPS are
midway between the columns. So, the ANSI phone could be made to recognize whether or not other digits followed a STOP request and respond differently depending on what, if anything, followed.
DF
If you ever decide to sell it, let me know.
Quote from: Dominic_ContempraPhones on September 30, 2015, 05:53:08 AM
If you ever decide to sell it, let me know.
Probably not any time soon. In the meantime, feast your eyes on this: Both versions together!
DF
The white one is nice, but me no like key systems.
Quote from: Dominic_ContempraPhones on October 01, 2015, 01:23:18 PM
The white one is nice, but me no like key systems.
I love keysets. If everyone liked the same things, there would be no need for this Forum!
DF