My Western Electric 500 from 1954 Find

[The Vintage]

OK last summer my brother and his friend helped one of my dad's friends' mom, you still with me, clear out her house. She was apparently doing some kind of spring cleaning. Anyway I imagine she was quite an old lady because my bro came home with a sweet old phone that she was throwing out. He thought it was just a good conversation piece, I as well, and we thought nothing more of it since then, until a few days ago. Thats' right, a full year sitting on a Western Electric 500.

At the time and until recently, I had no idea what kind of phone it was or from when and didn't really bother to know. Until yesterday. The rotary was jammed and didn't kick back and my dad suggested a few days ago to take it apart and grease it up. So I did, and not only greased up the cogs but cleaned out the entire inside of the phone. Figured I came this far already. Low and behold I see a date on the inside of the plastic and it says 6/54. So I dig deeper and see Western Electric written on it and 500 on the metal on the bottom.

So the next day, being today, I do a few Google searches and one trip to Radioshack later I found out about this site, the "Rotatone," and how to bring one of these babies back to life.

So I wired a terminal in the phone case, a snap in phone jack at Radioshack connected to 22 guage wire and spade lugs, jack in a new cord to it, and wire tie it inside the case in the event of someone tripping on it. And Bam. I have a perfectly functioning classic old phone from 1954, minus the ability to dial of course. The end... until I get a Rotatone of course. Gotta have that dialing.

[AE_Collector]

Obviously you have tried dialing with it and it doesn't work? Most conventional telephone company lines still work dial pulse OR touch tone. Some VOIP services don't accept dial pulse though. If it doesn't dial on its own, it could be a dial problem that needs to be corrected.

Terry

[Phonesrfun]

Yes, I am confused like Terry is.  I would say that unless you are on one of the VoIP systems that no longer work with rotary dialing, it is more the norm that it would work, rather than not.  Can you describe what you are using for telephone service and why you need a rotatone?

[McHeath]

Welcome.  Nice tale.  I too got into old phones that way, I had an old rotary wall phone hanging the garage for almost a decade before I even bothered to take a look at it.  (It was just hanging on a nail)  After searching the web I found out what it was and how to wire it, then shazam it worked.  I assume your 500 is black, which was the common color esp in the 50's. 

It should dial if you are using traditional landlines.  VOIP is another matter and it may not until you put a rotatone in it.  There are also adaptors you can buy that it plugs into and then they plug into the jack to convert the dial pulses to tones.

[bingster]

Just out of curiosity, when you say you "greased" the dial, do you mean actual grease?  And where did you put it?  That may be part of the dialing problem, as they are designed to be lubricated with an incredibly small amount of light oil.

[Dennis Markham]

"The Vintage", check out this posting.  I posted some photos of a #7 dial that I cleaned, showing oiling points.

http://www.classicrotaryphones.com/forum/index.php?topic=285.0

On those areas I indicate with arrows, I put just enough fine oil on the axis of the gear.  While holding it upside down I spin the dial once to allow the oil to seep into the joint.  I then take a Q-tip and absorb excess/remaining oil.  That is all you need.  There should be no need to grease the main gear or any of the gears at the cogs.  Just the axis points.

[Dan/Panther]

Welcome to our workshop We will have you up and dialing in no time.
D/P

[The Vintage]

Wow. So many responses. I use Verizon FIOS. Tried calling a few times and before I finish dialing I get the "If you would like to make a call please hang up and dial again" voice. I used light oil, my use of terminology was more for effect than accuracy, sorry. I am currently Googling whether FIOS in my area allows pulse dialing.

On a side note I did not know the Rotatone was mainly for VOIP services that don't allow pulse.

[The Vintage]

HAHAHA. She works. It turns out I was dialing too fast. I just tried her slow and steady and she dialed correctly. awesome. Thank you guys. This site is awesome.

[AdamAnt316]

I have Verizon FiOS as well. Their pulse detection system seems to be very particular about the speed of the pulses. If the dial is too slow (or too fast, as it would seem), it doesn't acknowledge the digit at all. Fortunately, most of my rotary phones (including the Card Dialer) are within FiOS's pulse speed range, though a few of them aren't for one reason or another (my turquoise Trimline is one of them, even though it's dial speed seems fine, and it worked fine on Verizon's POTS service). On the upside, however, if your rotary dial registers properly, you can use it for phone menus which ask you to press a certain number for items (probably doesn't work for * and #, of course), including voice mail (I made a special punch card for our FiOS voice mail which dials the voice mail access number, stops, then dials our password once I prompt it to continue). Anyway, congrats on your acquisition! It's a long and slippery slope, but fortunately, a fun one to be on.  
-Adam

[Phonesrfun]

A new rigntone??

I am not sure what you mean.  Are you saying that it gives you a dial tone again?

[The Vintage]

Yes, dial tone. But of course I fixed it. The piece of plastic that is oval shaped that spins and causes the disconnections for each pulse, was not on all the way causing the plastic below it to slip, which stopped the pulsing. I pushed it on all the way and it works fine now.

[Phonesrfun]

Good work.  Sometimes that's all it takes