Is it just me or ?

[Dan/Panther]

The AE phones seem under built, the Kellogg phones seem over engineered, and the Western Electric, seem to be a good balance of both ?
D/P

[WesternElectricBen]

Sounds just about right to me.

Ben

[dsk]

As my first impression, Yes, right!
But..

My AE 40 are definitely the best phone I have. (I know the case has a tendency to be a weak point, but mine are as new).
And not to forget, my payphone AE 120B but thats probably not unik for AE. No other telephones has given me more joy.
The Kellogg Redbar has some weak bakelite parts in the circuit block or whatever we call it. Yes it seems to be over-engineered in hence of an early "plug and play idea." I will like to add SC who probably even has been some experimental, but the 1243/1250 are probably as good as WE-302 who might be the most reliable ever made.

dsk

[BDM]

My take is this. Ma Bell had a serious vested interest in both reliability and service. After all they were a service provider as well as manufacturing their own equipment. The others for the most part were simply manufactures. While it was in the best interest of all the manufactures to produce reliable equipment that was easy to service, seems W.E. took this thought to a higher level over all.

With that in mind and speaking of desk sets/phones from the 1930s forward, I believe the A.E. 40 & early 80 sets were an equal to the 302/500 sets. Same with the S.C. 1243 (and subsequent models). The Kellogg Redbar seems to be a really nicely designed/engineered phone, but I'm simply not crazy about their handsets nor the receiver/transmitters used with them. W.E. dials vs A.E.? I could strip either make dial to the bone in my sleep. I still find A.E. dials slightly easier to service (including gov adjustments) and parts commonality superior. Just MHO, your mileage may vary