1962 Beige 564 Multiline

[WEBellSystemChristian]

I have been wanting a round-button WE Multiline in color for a long time, and now I finally have one! I won it recently for $14.99 in an eBay auction, and it arrived today unscathed. Despite the original housing, nothing else matches. the line cord is '69, handset cord is off-brand, 9C dial is from '70, and the handset is missing. At least the real prize here, the housing, has no cracks. It was in a very smokey office at one point, but the burned-in nicotine is being treated in the UV box right now.

I'm just thankful that every vultured phone I buy lately happens to be a common color, in this case beige. I have a spare G3 handset and dial/dial bezel/fingerwheel mounting gear, so I'm ready to assemble it right after its peroxide bath.

I'll post after pictures when it's done.

http://www.ebay.com/itm/331631617081

[dumb_old_guy]

Very nice! I haven't seen a round button in years.
I wish we had the old multiline phones that, at one time, were in the house I live in. My wife and I bought this house from her mother's estate. My mother-in-law was a realtor, for many years, with here office at home. The phone system here still has the old 25 pair cabling and the 110 punch-down block...but no phones. I suppose Ma Bell still owned those when the system was changed, and took them back.

cheers
Rob

[WEBellSystemChristian]

Very nice! I haven't seen a round button in years.
I wish we had the old multiline phones that, at one time, were in the house I live in. My wife and I bought this house from her mother's estate. My mother-in-law was a realtor, for many years, with here office at home. The phone system here still has the old 25 pair cabling and the 110 punch-down block...but no phones. I suppose Ma Bell still owned those when the system was changed, and took them back.

cheers
Rob

That's pretty cool that your house still has all that equipment! I think it would be pretty cool to convert it all back to multiline equipment, phones and all.

[dumb_old_guy]

It would be cool, but I know I'll never do it.
We are planning to disconnect our land line anyway and just use cell phones. At that point I would like to set up an intercom system between upstairs and downstairs using old phones. I would like the other to ring when the handset is lifted, or perhaps make a three phone system that can be dialed. (The house isn't big enough to really need three, but then I would have a reason to use the dials.)

cheers
Rob

[compubit]

To setup the phones in the house to be able to dial, pick up a small Panasonic switch (frequently found on eBay for not much money) - since the house has multiple pair, they could be easily wired. 

Once connected, you may want to consider a VoIP line (fed into the switch) - you can get them for next to nothing a month (and some are prepaid, meaning you give them an amount, say $5, and they deduct the costs as you use them until your balance is 0, then you add more money).  If you want to keep your existing number, you can (if your area has local number portability)

I have one through Call Centric - they'll even give you a free phone number from somewhere in New York (you have several locations to choose from) and incoming calls are free (all calls to other Call Centric 777 users are also free - 777 is their internal "area code" for free users).  Outgoing calls to the public network (US & Canada) are just under 2¢/minute.  You can also get a local phone number to your area, but you'll pay a couple of dollars a month, plus 1.5¢/minute to receive calls.  I also use VOIP.ms as a provider - I have a couple of lines over my internet connection at a fraction of what Verizon Residential wants to charge me for the privilege of using their copper!

Jim

[Telephone_Singer22]

I love it!!! I hope to God that soon I find a good multi line phone for cheap. I do have a Northern Electric 510 telephone set and a ITT 3 line telephone that I can only connect directly to the network. I cannot hook up at the terminal block because whoever made it single line cut off all the solder points. As soon as I get a soldering iron, I'll be able to use it how it meant to be used

[podor]

That's a sweet deal on the phone. The round button color sets are some of my favorite.

I just booked up a Panasonic KX-T61610  in my house as an intercom. It has 16 extensions and 6 CO inputs. Each extension has a 2 digit phone number. You can dial 9 to access the best available CO line to dial out or choose a specific line. You can even transfer a call from 1 extension to another. The can be programmed with a specific Panasonic phone to do even more. I have a Magic jack that I use with it currently. I also have a XLink Bluetooth gateway that I use with my cell phone. It makes any phone work as a Bluetooth hand set. It will even convert rotary to tone. I'm using that with my 1A2 phone exchange system, but it could work with the Panasonic as well. My challenge was getting each room wired, but that may be easy with your 25 pair cable and some punch down blocks, depending on your skill level. The system is very nice and easy to use. I highly recommend it I think there is a Panasonic PBX section on this forum.

I have also seen some 551b 1A2 KSU systems with 3 phones on ebay for around $300, wired and ready to go. That would probably be what ran the system in your house. That would pretty awesome. I would love to have 25 pair in my house.

[dumb_old_guy]

Thank, Jim.
I don't want to hijack, so am sending a PM for more info.

cheers
Rob

[Mr. Bones]

Nice 564, Christian!

It's 1 month younger than I am (2/62)

Best regards!

[WEBellSystemChristian]

Wow, it took almost one year to restore this!

It turned out to be very hard to find parts for this phone. Sometime in 1963 or so, Western Electric slightly changed the Light Beige pigment by adding a little more pink. This isn't very obvious, almost impossible to tell apart by itself, but putting later plastics next to earlier plastics makes the difference stand out. That meant I had to look for a dial bezel, handset, and cord from 1960-1962!!

I eventually found a heavily abused 1960 handset on a 2558, and a 1962 bezel and dial mech on a Frankenphone. The caps and cord are from 1965, and while the caps do have some pink to them, they look fine for now. The pictures are a little washed out, but the color looks true Beige in person. Here's how it looks after several peroxide baths and a new dial card:

[jsowers]

Christian, you certinly made a huge improvement on that keyset. Who would have ever known light beige would be a hard color to match?

I looked at the auction pictures, which fortunately are still there because the seller included them in the body of the auction. The shot of the logo made me curious. It just says "Western Electric" and not Bell System. Also the former card was Centel, an independent telco. So did WE make generic keysets for use by other telcos, like the 591 and 593 single line sets I'm more familiar with? The markings look to be 564 H+ and I don't see that exact variation on Paul's site, or any info about a 564 made for other telcos. It's funny how they didn't change the model number like they did on the 591/593 sets.

Or maybe all keysets lack the Bell System on the logo and I'm just now noticing? I only have one black round button keyset and it's packed away and my pictures don't include the logo. I did find a 564 round button keyset on eBay that has Bell System on it, so I feel sure you may have one made for an independent.

I do also remember another black round button keyset used by an independent telco. It was the one in my mom's first office at the school system where she worked. All the rest of the phones in the office building were black AE keysets with the side switchhook and hers was a black round button WE keyset. I never knew why they had that one in there. It worked fine and I may have been the only one who noticed it was different.

[WEBellSystemChristian]

I bought another keyset from the same seller, also Beige, dated early '70s IIRC. It also had no Bell markings, and I used the housing to replace the smashed original on my 1965 Beige 565 (had a Bell-marked housing originally). I have never seen another keyset without Bell markings, other than these two. I would guess that both phones were used by an independent, because the 1962 had a later ITT handset cord, and the dial was late '70s WE.

My Dad remembers seeing a Black 554 with round line buttons in my grandparents' doctor's office when he was young. I showed him the 'prototype' 554 multiline on Paul F's site, and he swears it looked like that. More than likely it was a single line 554 with a separate multiline module mounted on the wall underneath it.

[poplar1]

The markings look to be 564 H+ and I don't see that exact variation on Paul's site, or any info about a 564 made for other telcos. It's funny how they didn't change the model number like they did on the 591/593 sets.

                   Telephone sets wired with the black and red ringer leads on the RR and RT
                   terminals will have a ( + ) sign after the code number on base of set.

                   (BSP Section 502-525-405, Issue 3, March, 1962; Key Telephone Sets, 565HDR)

[unbeldi]

I looked at the auction pictures, which fortunately are still there because the seller included them in the body of the auction. The shot of the logo made me curious. It just says "Western Electric" and not Bell System. Also the former card was Centel, an independent telco. So did WE make generic keysets for use by other telcos, like the 591 and 593 single line sets I'm more familiar with? The markings look to be 564 H+ and I don't see that exact variation on Paul's site, or any info about a 564 made for other telcos. It's funny how they didn't change the model number like they did on the 591/593 sets.

Or maybe all keysets lack the Bell System on the logo and I'm just now noticing? I only have one black round button keyset and it's packed away and my pictures don't include the logo. I did find a 564 round button keyset on eBay that has Bell System on it, so I feel sure you may have one made for an independent.

1A1 and 1A2 equipment was also made either for Bell System use or for independent distribution through Graybar, etc.

Bell System sets had the BELL SYSTEM emblem just like single line telsets.
On the key telephone system units and panels the plastic housing usually had a metal or plastic label that was switched out without 'BELL SYSTEM', and the type was stamped with a W appended.

Here is a brand new 513A2-W:

[podor]

Looks fantastic! Very nice!