Brazilian Starlite Phone

[TIPandRING]

I thought it was interesting. I own a number of GTE/Automatic Electric "Startlite" phones and had not seen one manufactured in Brazil.

https://www.ebay.com/itm/225821546497

?mkcid=16&mkevt=1&mkrid=711-127632-2357-0&ssspo=mPmKaelFT_a&sssrc=2047675&ssuid=&widget_ver=artemis&media=COPY  ( remove extraneous, unnecessary eBay html code )

[G-Man]

I thought it was interesting. I own a number of GTE/Automatic Electric "Startlite" phones and had not seen one manufactured in Brazil.

https://www.ebay.com/itm/225821546497?mkcid=16&mkevt=1&mkrid=711-127632-2357-0&ssspo=mPmKaelFT_a&sssrc=2047675&ssuid=&widget_ver=artemis&media=COPY

It is my understanding that AECo only had manufacturing plants located in the U.S., Canada, Belgium and Italy.

Was this telephone set actually manufactured there or was it exported by AECo in the U.S. or by one of their other international manufacturing subsidiaries and labeled by the local distributor in Brazilian (Portuguese) native tongue accordingly?

[TIPandRING]

Interesting. I just assumed it was actually manufactured in Brazil due to the quality control sticker and Rau Funchal address.

Maybe an international collector will chime in.

[rdelius]

Not a US built Starlite.

[Kellogg Kitt]

Not a US built Starlite.

Agreed.  It is similar, but different.

- The dial is totally different.
- The opening in the shell that holds the dial is different.
- Handset cord connects to the base at a different location.
- Bottom is metal.  All of my US-made Starlites are plastic.

For comparison, here is a US-made Starlite.

[Jon Kolger]

Early AE Starlites had a metal base.  It was only later on that they changed over to a plastic base.

[LM Ericsson]

I have a Brazilian Starlite. This one however , has a slightly different dial, similar to the AE ones with the plastic gears. This one was leased from TELESP ( Telecomunicações de São Paulo S.A) which was the operator of Sistema Telebrás who operated out of São Paulo. Their logo is found on the dial center. Mine has the metal bottom  which is a removable plate which reveals the bottom of the terminals where everything is soldered (please note that that is my soldering job where I removed everything for cleaning and re-soldered, not the best, of course). The inside components are more similar to the Italian Starlite than the American one, so it's possible they obtained a license from Autelco to produce theirs. Most components are labled "Brasil" and the underside of the housing has "GTE Brasil" molded in. The bottom of the phone has the model information and a quality control sticker as well.

[LM Ericsson]

Continued...

[AL_as_needed]

That is interesting. How would that be worked out? Would GTE send down internal parts and they are final assembled with locally made plastics?

[LM Ericsson]

That's my theory, however, it could be that they have the license to produce everything to the specification by having the same mouldings for the plastics AND specifications to the Italian Starlite in independent electronic production companies. There is one called Daruma Telecomunicações e Informática S.A. that was once producing equipment, though had long since closed. Some of their Starlites had their sticker on the bottom.

[AL_as_needed]

Could simply be the international division of the company. Its was GTE, but based in south America to better access that market.

[LM Ericsson]

Their Sao Paulo location was merely a distribution center, not a manufacturing center, which is why figuring this out is such a head-scratcher! My guess is that the independent electronics companies such as Daruma are producing/assembling these telephones and sending them over to GTE Sao Paulo to then distribute for the Telebras. It's too bad there isn't much info on the production of telephones in South America.

[TIPandRING]

LM Ericsson, those are great pictures. Thank you.

[AL_as_needed]

Gotta love it when you find something that seems to be a common phone, but then turns into a complete mystery! Adventures in phone collecting!