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WE light gray 1-58 500

Started by jsowers, July 22, 2009, 04:00:00 PM

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jsowers

Did anyone else follow this auction? It was canceled and then relisted. It's a mostly soft plastic light gray 500 from January, 1958.

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=220452374678
( dead link 08-04-21 )

It plainly has a replaced dial and fingerwheel and shows where it's melted in the front. Can everyone see that? I attached a picture of a gray soft plastic 554 with the correct 7C dial. Note the difference in the center. The spider and nut holding it on are totally different. The fingerwheel is different too.

I hope I haven't stepped on any toes here. If the high bidder is among us, please share your thoughts. The picture below is not the phone in the auction, nor is it mine. Just for illustration.
Jonathan

Dennis Markham

I had seen that gray phone.  I noticed the things you mentioned---the replacement dial and the damage to the front.  I am very surprised that the ending price was that high.

McHeath

I also saw that phone and noticed the changes and melting on the side. 

Jester

I stayed up to snipe at this one at the last minute, and was amazed how far past me the final bid went.  I think one factor in the final price was the third bidder, who seemed to have thrown in a high "cushion" bid as he did not intend to stay up & watch it.  As for the final bidder, I can only offer this sentiment-- in the words of Briscoe Darling-- "More power to ya"!
Stephen

Dan

Light grey seems to be a hard one to get, but this one had a hard center finger wheel and a seven hole cap, so I knew it wasn't original. Still it is amazing to me it went that high, especially with the melting.
"Imagine how weird telephones would look if our ears weren't so close to our mouths." - Steven Wright

jsowers

Dan, go back and look at the auction. It was a 6-hole earcap. The only hard plastic was the dial face. Sadly, the handset and cords are the only really nice parts left on the phone, if you don't count the insides.

I find it interesting too that the seller thought it would be OK to just chop off the spades and try to crimp on a modular RJ-11 plug like that. It might work given half a chance, but probably not after a tug on the cord because you can't get all that round cord jacket in a hole meant for a flat 4-conductor cord. It wouldn't have any strain relief. I hope nobody has tried that and ruined a rare 1950s mounting cord. The cords are just as hard to find as the phones.
Jonathan

bwanna

i liked the way the seller gave instructions on how to install a modular end, like it was a BONUS :o
donna

Dan

Quote from: jsowers on July 22, 2009, 09:01:45 PM
Dan, go back and look at the auction. It was a 6-hole earcap. The only hard plastic was the dial face. Sadly, the handset and cords are the only really nice parts left on the phone, if you don't count the insides.

I find it interesting too that the seller thought it would be OK to just chop off the spades and try to crimp on a modular RJ-11 plug like that. It might work given half a chance, but probably not after a tug on the cord because you can't get all that round cord jacket in a hole meant for a flat 4-conductor cord. It wouldn't have any strain relief. I hope nobody has tried that and ruined a rare 1950s mounting cord. The cords are just as hard to find as the phones.

You are right sir it was a sixer. Does it seem there has been a real shortage of good old 500's on ebay lately?
"Imagine how weird telephones would look if our ears weren't so close to our mouths." - Steven Wright

JorgeAmely

Dan:

Not really. Check this one that almost flew under the radar:  260447491455

Jorge

Dan

Very good. I have two red soft 500's. I guess I meant yellows, oxford grays or rose beiges ::)
"Imagine how weird telephones would look if our ears weren't so close to our mouths." - Steven Wright

jsowers

That red 12-56 one was on my radar, but the shipping was a bit too high and I have plenty of reds. It went for an average price, I thought. Not too high, not too low, for red in good shape without gray cords. Red is fairly common in soft plastic 500s, as is pink. For whatever reason those two colors have survived in greater numbers.

I do agree with Dan about the rarer colors being in short supply lately. We just see red, pink, ivory and such. Dark beige (or rose beige) did make an appearance on the TCI listserv and picture place for sale from Russ Cowell recently and he's reduced the prices, according to what I heard from Dennis, so it's not totally gone away. But on the auction front, lately it's been, in the words of Jed Clampett, piiiiitiful.
Jonathan

Jester

Back to the subject of this thread, here is further thought on the blemish pictured at the front of the cover, just below the dial bezel.  Jonathan referred to this as "melting"-- I hadn't thought of this description for the damage before.  It seems to me to be accurate, but I am more interested in what caused it, and could it be reversed/ erased by normal means (sanding, polishing, etc.).  My idea of what caused this is mounted on the left side of the phone-- those lip-shaped marks on the cover look to me like a match to the coils on the spring handset cord.  Simply put, I believe the cord & cover were touching each other at this spot for a long enough period that a chemical reaction took place between the two.  Or, to be more accurate, as the two parts decomposed-- "gassed" as we like to call it-- the by products of these seperate reactions reacted with one another, causing the marks on the cover.  Since there doesn't seem to be any real color change, it would appear to me that the marks could be sanded down & polished out.  Anyway, that's my story & I'm sticking to it.
Stephen

foots

I had watched an acution recently on a gray WE 6 line phone with lighted round butons, that was still in its original box. It went for $150 something.
"Ain't Worryin' 'Bout Nothin"

Jester

I guess that seller had more than one, foots.  Check out #270432084534

It went up a little over an hour ago.
Stephen

Dennis Markham

Jester, I agree that those raised marks on the phone appear to be made from the cord.  But the one angle looks like the front, on the left side appears to be caved in (for lack of a better term).  Look at the photo attached.   More of the left foot pad is visible and it just looks like the front is warped.  But this could be an optical illusion.

The marks you mention are not uncommon as you know.  I have had to sand off a few from time to time.  They just do not polish out with Novus.  Often those marks are seen on the bottom of the phones too-----after the phone has been set atop the handset cord for a long period of time.