Western Electric Rail Road Ringer box-Interesting parts Inside...

[John S]

Hey----

Bought this at a flea market.  Very nice oak ringer box.  The inside is something I never seen before.  Its really cool with the mechanism inside.  It was surrounded by glass, but its has a big chunk missing... Its very cool.  Everything inside is labeled Western Electric.  Anyone seen anything like this before?  Its really heavy for its size.........

John

[poplar1]

For selective ringing. All the combinations (8 6 3 on this one?) add up to the same number of pulses, but divided differently. When the correct code is sent, the bell rings. I remember seeing these at the local train station. The guy working there told me to listen to it; you could hear it pulsing, but it didn't ring because it was the wrong code.

[John S]

How very cool....all the little gadgets inside are really something...

[G-Man]

Typical selective signaling unit that was factory modified for train dispatching on the Chicago, Burlington and Quincy Railroad. These systems are covered extensively in the TCI Library.

Here are a couple of the many documents that it contains on the subject:

http://www.telephonecollectors.info/index.php/document-repository/doc_details/5355-we-railroad-telephone-and-selective-apparatus-1922-large-file

http://www.telephonecollectors.info/index.php/document-repository/doc_details/10090-railway-train-dispatching-telephone-systems-ib-672-large-file

[John S]

Thanks for the links....reading them......

John

[paul-f]

When you're done with those two, check out the rest in the Railway Telephones category!

Browse for it in the Document Repository -- Catalogs, Manuals...  / Western Electric.

-or-

Railway Telephones Catagory

http://www.telephonecollectors.info/index.php/browse/document-repository/catalogs-manuals/western-electric/cat_view/42-catalogs-manuals-and-educational-documents/49-western-electric-bell-system/61-publications-and-educational-documents/572-railway-telephones

Be sure to check out the features of the ringer in that box.  It's really special.

Those who took the Switchers' Tour after the TCI Lancaster show saw a working system with sender and receivers at several locations.

Here are photos of the type of sender we saw, a 61A.  It's basically a programmable preset dial with a big governor.  This one is dated 7-7-19.

[Russ Kirk]

Hi John,

I think this is a nice item and I have one in my collection also.  Mine is 160 AR #368.