20AL WE stick

[countryman]

The seller calls it a WE 353W and from the pics I found that might be true. But is it? The receiver is hung up upside down, but the hook is also on the wrong side? incorrect assembly or?
Asked price would be 65 € (~73 $ US). I'm aware that the subset is missing.

[Doug Rose]

From the limited pics, it's a WE stick with the Transmitter cup on backwards and upside down. You see the hole for the cords in the front....Doug

[FABphones]

...The receiver is hung up upside down, but the hook is also on the wrong side? incorrect assembly or?...

Flip the transmitter head up and over and the orientation of everything will be correct.

Ask the seller for a photo of the rear (currently 'front') of the perch, there should be a stamp to indicate which model stick. A close up photo of the tag and rear of transmitter would be good too.

[poplar1]

The seller calls it a WE 353W and from the pics I found that might be true. But is it?

353 BW is the part number for the transmitter only. It is probably a 40AL.

[countryman]

Thanks for your input!
I eventually bought it for 50,-€ incl. shipping. I'm excited what will arrive - it's my first candlestick 
The felt cover is missing, hopefully the internal parts will be OK.

[countryman]

I now received the phone and can show more pics.
The perch is stamped 20AL. It looks like it was never nickel plated but pressed brass. The tag on the transmitter says 353W. in fact it was easy to flip the transmitter over 
The actual transmitter capsule is a European replacement and was mounted "innovatively". I suspect it might be French ("BC"=Batterie centrale?). The hookswitch looks complete, likewise the receiver.
The finish of the housing does not look painted or japanned, more like the 40AL is described, with a gray coating created by a chemical treatment? There is some rust and chipped areas though, I wonder how this can be improved?
For now I will start to clean up everything...

[Doug Rose]

That is a Bower Barff finish on your stick. It is very durable BUT when damaged, it is damaged. Usually a Bower Barff is on a 40 AL. Still a fine looking Stick. Congrats....Doug

[countryman]

Thanks Doug.
A "real" candlestick is not an easy find here in Germany.

The base now recovered 
Originally it seems ruby suede was used. I could find small relics between the snap ring and the bottom plate. Mice must have chewed the rest. I had some leftover ruby velvet-like cloth that I used to upholster a chair. It matched in color and thickness. Fitting it went slicker than I thought. I'm quite happy with the result.

[poplar1]

I have never seen WE baseplates for desk stands in colors other than green felt, brown felt, or brown suede.

[countryman]

Hm. In fact the pieces that I found were too small and deteriorated to tell the exact color.

[countryman]

I have to ask again. What materials are used for mouthpiece, receiver body and earpiece? Is it all hard rubber (Ebonite)?

[countryman]

I decided to wire the candlestick for central battery operation, so that I can receive calls with it. My first thought was to use the subset I had built following dsk's suggestion from this thread.
But that won't work without alterations, because the 20AL does not have a double hookswitch. I had another anti sidetone induction coil from a German W48 left which is very versatile, as it's secondary winding is fully isolated and has separate terminals.
The coil is also slim enough to fit into the 20AL base. I wrapped it into packaging foam so that it is isolated and can't move inside. Doing the wiring was a little tricky, but now works. All modifications I did are fully reversible.
I could improve the damaged portions of the Bower Barff finish a little, too (pic will follow tomorrow).

The numbers in the diagram are the terminal # on the German coil
written in lower case are the wire colors used. Unfortunately they do not correspond with the
capital letters which are the original terminal marks due to the complete redesign of the diagram.

[poplar1]

I decided to wire the candlestick for central battery operation, so that I can receive calls with it. My first thought was to use the subset I had built following dsk's suggestion from this thread.
But that won't work without alterations, because the 20AL does not have a double hookswitch.

Somewhat off topic: you can wire a sidetone  WE 20AL, 40AL, or 50AL to an anti-sidetone subset such as WE 634, 684, or 302 base. It does require a 5-conductor cord rather than the 3-conductor provided on a 20AL, 40AL, or 50AL, but it will work even though there are only 3 make contacts (rather than 2 pairs of contacts) in the hookswitch.

The receiver connects to GN on the 101A induction coil in the subset
The transmitter connects to BK terminal in the subset
The common transmitter/receiver connects to R in the subset
Note that none of these leads goes through the hookswitch.

Then, 2 contacts of the hookswitch will require 2 conductors in the cord to the subset. One contact will connect to L2-Y. The other will connect to the BK terminal.

Line (dial tone) will connect to L1 and L2 on the induction coil.

Note that there will be a click in the receiver since the receiver is not disconnected before hanging up. (A varistor may be added in parallel with the receiver.)

This circuit is somewhat like a WE 500, where the receiver and transmitter are permanently connected to the network output, and the line (connected to L1 and L2) is interrupted by the dial (L1 through hookswitch to F, then through dial pulsing contacts to RR) and by the hookswitch (L2 through hookswitch to C). Of course, the 500D hookswitch opens both sides of the line, while the 500M and the 20AL as wired above open only one side of the line.

[countryman]

Thanks for your thoughts poplar1. I would prefer wiring an American subset, but they are even rarer than the phone itself on this side of the pond. So I took what I had.
My original plan was to build a makeshift subset, until I discovered I could tuck away the coil inside the base as well. The diagram would allow a 4-strand subset cord, but only if the secondary (receiver) circuit shares a wire with the anti-sidetone circuit (black in my sketch). This is not normally the case, but possible with the W48 coil.

[countryman]

finished pic.
The cords still leave room for further improvements...