Poker hand Black 500

[Greg G.]

Only thing I found after 4 hours of yard sale hopping last week, a $5 black 500.  The base is clean and it has the triangle suede feet, which I always prefer.  No cracks or gouges that I can see, but maybe some pitting on the cover, but I'll have to see how well it cleans up.  Fully functions, nice heavy-duty line cord at appears to be original.  6-hole receiver cap.  I'll have to take a look at my 3 or 4 other black 500s to see if they have 6-hole caps, I neglected to include that in my pictorial inventory.

I call it a "poker hand" 500 because the dates are spread out over 7 years and almost in sequence.  I'm missing the year 56.  I'm surprised there's no refurb stamps on it with all those different dates.  Can't quite tell what the year on the ringer is, I carefully cleaned it but it's still unreadable, 54 maybe.  The receiver element date wasn't stamped well to begin with, either 53 or 55 is my guess.  The network doesn't have a date, unless it's on a different spot than where it's usually found.

[Greg G.]

More pics.

[jsowers]

Briny, that's a true moldy oldie. I call them "early refurbs" since the dates don't match and they're all in the 1950s. They started refurbing 500s early on. I'd just assume the latest date of a component is around when the refurb happened, but you can never tell. The bell looks like 4-53 to me. The date on the network may be behind the paper label, but don't take it loose to find out. Assume it's the same as the base.

It should clean up and look great. Well worth the $5 you spent.

[Greg G.]

This is only the second worse "moldy oldie" I've found.  The 5302 I found 2 years ago is still the worst.  I still use it as my main phone by my computer.

http://www.classicrotaryphones.com/forum/index.php?topic=3039.0

[LarryInMichigan]

This is only the second worse "moldy oldie" I've found.  The 5302 I found 2 years ago is still the worst.  I still use it as my main phone by my computer.

I can take most of the blame for that one

Larry

[RotarDad]

Nice phone for $5, and full of 50's parts.  I see a 359T on the mouthpiece which I believe means tested in March '59, probably about the date of your refurb.  Your cord restraint date is also consistent with that.   I think 4/52 is the beginning of the C/D 500 with the 425B network.  I don't think I've seen an earlier 425B.

[McHeath]

I would have quickly bought it for 5 bucks, no questions asked.  The mold is pretty amazing, don't really see that here as it's so dry.  Wonder what it would have looked like in another 50 years?  All fuzzy?

[liteamorn]

Can you make out the date on the ringer ? All i can make out is 4-5

[Greg G.]

Can you make out the date on the ringer ? All i can make out is 4-5

No, I can't.  I carefully cleaned it, but still can't read it.

[Greg G.]

The after pics.  My apologies for the Sharpie pen touch up on the finger wheel, I don't know what I was thinking, but Sharpies look like crap because it turns reddish on metal.  I'll have to paint the finger wheel now, but at least the phone isn't sitting around all moldy and icky.

The housing polished up fairly well, but has a few nicks and scratches.  The handset did not, I'm not sure if it's bakelite or plastic.  Some things I noticed as I was taking it apart:

The mod adapter was hacked to accommodate the line cord.  I was actually relieved that they hacked the adapter and not the line cord.

The dial has some additional markings on it, I'm assuming they are refurb markings, but I'm not sure.

This is the oldest 500 I have so far.

[LarryInMichigan]

I mentioned here before that I use a black Testors brand paint marker for touch-ups on finger wheel and such.  The color matches very well, and the paint is reasonably durable.  The Ace hardware stores here sell them.

The G1 handset is bakelite.  Once they look dull and brownish gray like that, they are difficult to restore.  Doug's skin lotion method can help alot to darken the bakelite.  Black wax shoe polish can also be helpful if it is brushed into the bakelite with a rotary tool or high speed polisher.

Larry

[Greg G.]

I mentioned here before that I use a black Testors brand paint marker for touch-ups on finger wheel and such.  The color matches very well, and the paint is reasonably durable.  The Ace hardware stores here sell them.

There's an Ace hardware just down the road from me, I'll put the Testors paint marker on my list.

The G1 handset is bakelite.  Once they look dull and brownish gray like that, they are difficult to restore.  Doug's skin lotion method can help alot to darken the bakelite.  Black wax shoe polish can also be helpful if it is brushed into the bakelite with a rotary tool or high speed polisher.

Larry

That's what I thought.  I do have a bench mounted buffer I just bought, I may try the shoe polish method.  I also have some Avon Skin SS, but I'm too lazy to take the handset apart again.

[Greg G.]

I couldn't let that embarrassing Sharpie marking job remain for long, so I checked with my friendly Ace Hardware, but they did not have the Testors paint markups.  They had some Krylon appliance touch up markers, but not in black.  Not to worry, I sanded the finger wheel down and painted it.  I actually had to do that three times.  The first time I tripped and bumped the work table when the primer was still tacky sent the finger wheel cartwheeling, consequently it got gunk on it.  The second time I made sure I didn't go anywhere near it as it was drying, but as I was tightening the nut that holds on the finger wheel, the pliers slipped and put a big scratch on it.  Third time was the charm.

I tried buffing the handset with black shoe polish, but with disappointing results, so I put the handset in a large baggie and immersed it in Avon SSS for a week with better results.  

Anyway, here's the before and after pics.  I just need to lube the dial a bit.

[LarryInMichigan]

It looks really nice.  i will have to send you some finger wheels to paint

Larry