What's wrong with this subset?

[Greg G.]

I forgot I had this thing.  If my memory is correct, it came with a candlestick I bought some time back.  I never bothered with it (the subset) because it appears to have some parts missing.

[LarryInMichigan]

It looks like it's all there, and there's some bonus dust as well .  Connect one side of the ringer to L1 and the other to K.  Connect the R, G, Y, and B wires from the mounting cord to R, GN, L1, and BK, respectively.  Clean off the dust, and you should have a working subset.

Larry

[Phonesrfun]

Looks complete to me.  It just has a 101A induction coil, which is newer and smaler than that subset was originally designed for, but many of these subsets were updated in that way.

[Greg G.]

The areas that I marked with an arrow looked like they were missing some contacts, but I wasn't sure.

[LarryInMichigan]

The areas that I marked with an arrow looked like they were missing some contacts, but I wasn't sure.

Those terminals do not need to be there because they are present on the induction coil.

Larry

[poplar1]

I think Larry means connect yellow conductor from the 202 or 151AL or 211 to Y/L2.
This  634BA subset was converted from a 534; originally there were more terminals on the black terminal block, but as Larry said they were no longer all needed once the induction coil was updated from a 46-type induction coil to one with terminals.

Still, it is odd that the terminal for ground is labeled L1, even though there are two other places marked ground.

[Greg G.]

Thanks for analyzing this thing.  The candlestick by itself was all I wanted and the subset just came with it.  I had doubts when I looked at the subset because it appeared to be missing some parts, but figured I could use it for parts.  It's an added bonus that it's intact.  And yes, I've cleaned the dust off, that's an old picture.

[poplar1]

You were lucky to get the original subset with the phone. I assume the phone is marked 151AL.

I asked a retired NY Telephone installer-repairman why they left so many subsets on the wall in old apartments. He said that they were allowed 7 minutes to remove the phone, but none extra for the subset; so they just left it.

[Greg G.]

You were lucky to get the original subset with the phone. I assume the phone is marked 151AL.

As a matter of fact, it is.  It also has a 4H dial.  This is one of the phones I have boxed up for lack of room.  I don't know if it even functions, I never got around to hooking it up.  I'm tempted to dig it out, but I already have 3 other phone projects going right now.  What I do remember is it had a cheesy repro transmitter cup (which I replaced with the real deal) and a phony-baloney diaphragm that looked like somebody cut out of sheet metal (also replaced).

Here's the original thread:  http://www.classicrotaryphones.com/forum/index.php?topic=5520.0

[poplar1]

The transmitter looks OK (other than the repro mouthpiece from Turtle Lake Telephone Company). They crossed out the number because it was updated---probably to a 337. The new number and new date are usually stamped in vermillion and can be seen when you unscrew the mouthpiece.

It appears that in 1938 (date on the induction coil) they were still using the older style transmitter and receivers. Within a short time they would have remanufactured the 151ALs with the bulldog (635A) transmitter and 706A receiver, making the talking circuit equivalent to that of a 302.

I have not seen WE dial candlesticks with manufacture dates later than 1930, but they continued to upgrade them and reissue them until the late 1940s. This was partly because of the backlog of install orders after World War II.