Some Pics Of My AE 40

[19and41]

This unit came from an antique dealer in Winston-Salem.  The handset had a coat of thick grime I had to remove to handle it much.  The mic and earphone caps were as though they were glued on and with a little encouragement from my strap wrench they came off, revealing lint glued on the faces of each, which I wiped off with a little alcohol.  I hope to adapt this unit to use a pulse to tone converter to use with my internet phone service.  I have tried the handset and ringer with it and they seem to work pretty well.

[AE40FAN]

Love the AE40's 

[unbeldi]

Seems to me the handset cord is miswired on both ends.  Inside the phone on the screw posts, the color sequence should be red, green, and then yellow when moving away from the induction coil. 


But I do love the looks of these too.

[19and41]

Thanks, I'll try to remember that when I remove the handset and it's innards when I work on the handsets' finish.

[unbeldi]

I think I have seen AE40 diagrams with handset cords that also came with red, white and black leads, as well as red, orange, and brown (or so).

Perhaps AE40FAN has some more details on the history of AE color codes.

[19and41]

Are there any ways to date these phones?  Just curious.

[unbeldi]

Are there any ways to date these phones?  Just curious.

The telephone makers that didn't also run telco operating companies, were much less interested, it seems, in marking their devices with dates.  The Bell System on the other hand had their entire economics worked out in terms of recycling and using the equipment to the limits of their design life.

Your phone still has a No. 24 dial, recognizable from the removable contact spring assembly, so that places it perhaps before 1951, when the No. 51 dial was introduced.

There might be a date on the condenser next to the ringer on the base plate. Please check.
Was there a diagram folded and glued on the base plate?  Perhaps the issue no. of that might be an indication.


PS: looking at your pics again, there is indeed a diagram, what is the issue no?  It should also tell the original color coding for the handset cord.

[AE_Collector]

Love the AE40's 

And all this time I thought you were just a "fan" of AE40's!

I think I have seen AE40 diagrams with handset cords that also came with red, white and black leads, as well as red, orange, and brown (or so).

Perhaps AE40FAN has some more details on the history of AE color codes.

I cant recall seeing drawings with whte, black, red leads but maybe if equipped with back rubber cords? The red, oronge, brown handset cord coding was AE's cloth cords.

Are there any ways to date these phones?  Just curious.

Dating most of AE's products is not easy. I have this topic here on CRPF which us an attempt to gather info on the AE bakelite phone era with hopes of one day analyzing it all to decipher AE's coding and to narrow manufacturing dates down a bit.

http://www.classicrotaryphones.com/forum/index.php?topic=5514.0

Terry

[unbeldi]

I cant recall seeing drawings with whte, black, red leads but maybe if equipped with back rubber cords? The red, oronge, brown handset cord coding was AE's cloth cords.

Terry

Ah, yes. Correct on both counts.

I have pics and diagram...

The diagram shows red/white/black and also the flexible cloth cord coloring (c.f. Note #4).
This AE40 has a coiled rubber cord with the r/w/b coding.
The terminals in the handset actually show the color codes also with letter codes.

[jsowers]

I live just south of Winston-Salem and I know what area your phone came from originally. Not Winston-Salem, which was Southern Bell territory. The phone number with the 476 prefix means it came from Thomasville, NC, just to the east of me. It was then and still is served by North State Telephone Co, an independent telco. They served Thomasville and nearby High Point, two cities with a great history of furniture making and retailing.

Lexington, where I'm from, was also served by an independent telco, Lexington Telephone Co., and I remember many AE40s like this from childhood in the school, doctor's office and the houses of friends and relatives. It's interesting that some parts are chrome but not all. Our AE40 had a chrome handhold and switchhook buttons and yours seems to have black items there. Ours had a black fingerwheel and yours has chrome. The chrome parts are always very cool to the touch. The number card looks like the original and you're lucky it's still there.

[19and41]

The phone has a layout.  It is the folded paper just above the ringer in pic 614.  I have opened the sluggish dial assembly and removed the dial and number panel and cleaned out the old and hard lubricant with a spray that uses a menthol solvent.  I then used synthetic oil on the wear points and shaft bushings and reassembled.  It sounds nice and consistent now.

[19and41]

After a short time to adjust to the price, I've ordered the housing to base rubber gasket and a rotatone device.  The semiconductor devices needed to install the rotatone are coming from a different supplier.  Now to find a set of handset caps.  The originals are eroded beyond being able to aesthetically refinish where the handset would have first contacted if it were laid on a flat surface. 

[AE_Collector]

Most collectors start with AE40's and 50's that are as inexpensive as they can find. Then they start looking for the chromed handset caps which can cost as much as the phone. $35 to $50 for a set of chromed caps is quite normal.

Generally easier and less expensive overall to search but the best deal you can find on the phone with chromed caps in the first place. Since you need new caps anyway, you may want to try to locate chromed caps as you will probably be looking for them next anyway!

Terry

[19and41]

It may be a while before I go for the Chrome trim, as this adaptation for the tone dialing will be a big enough investment for the time being.  Even though I grew up in a Bell System community, I still like the the older AE's.  I did a diy installation using a AE 40 I got from Burden sales in Nebraska when I was 13.  That was over 10 years before the breakup and we had a couple of visits from the phone company to disconnect it.  So I guess they were my first phone.

[19and41]

After a lot of research,  I had decided to go with the Dialgizmo device for the tone conversion.  I got the unit yesterday and it seems to work pretty well.  I was able to navigate my pharmacy's DTMF ordering routine.