magneto phone intercom possible?

[foots]

  I am interested in setting up a line from my house to my brother's house next door. I was wondering if phones such as my SC 1248 and possibly a Leich could be used or would I have to get army field phones or the like?  How would such a system be hooked up? This subject was brought up breifly last year  in a post

http://www.classicrotaryphones.com/forum/index.php?topic=1723.0

[Phonesrfun]

It just takes a two conductor wire between your house and his,  and a battery for each, and the phones must be operational.  The army field phones are nothing but repackaged local battery phones.

What you will want to do for batteries is go to Radio Shack and get a plastic battery holder that holds either two size C or two size D batteries.  And a couple batteries each for each phone.  Hook the battery holder wires to the terminals in the phone for the battery.  Polarity is not important.  Hook the wire to L1 and L2 (or what ever designation is for the line) and hook the other end to the other phone.

Pretty simple, really.  I would test it with the phones sitting right next to each other first.  Test both ringing and talking.   It is a lot easier to trouble shoot with them right next to each other than running back and forth between houses.

[keysys]

Ralph Meyer's book "Old Time Telephones" may provide some useful information.  Within chapter 22, there's a section titled "Construction of Private Lines" and a sub-section pertaining to local battery magnetos.  There's a simple diagram, figure 22-8 in the first edition of the book, or figure 22-9 in the second edition, plus other related information throughout the book.  Book might be available in your local public library.

[Jim Stettler]

Ralph's book is well worth owning. He has several diagrams for hooking up intercoms.
As far as local magneto set intercoms, they are designed for this application. If the phones  work, It should be perrty simple to string the wire, and have a simple set-up.
JMO,
Jim