Red Phones

[finlover]

I am always amazed on how you refinish your phones

Thanks a million, meinaichizu!  It just takes a lot of sanding, polishing and buffing--the trick is knowing when to stop sanding...

[Kenny C]

ha that always been a easy #to remember i dunno why.

[easytiger]

My one and only.  I'm a fool for a phone with vents.  Recently outfitted with a genuine Extensicord, still looking for information or photos of original AE40 line/mounting cords (see referenced thread)...baby could use a cord.

http://www.classicrotaryphones.com/forum/index.php?topic=3414.0

[Kenny C]

Here is what my parents are getting me + a lap top 

[JorgeAmely]

... My one and only ...

Aaaah, a red AE40 with chrome bands. One of my favorite phones. Usually they go for 4 figures on ebay. I wish I had one in that color. Instead, I have one in ivory. I have attached a picture below.

[JorgeAmely]

Here is what my parents are getting me + a lap top 

Congratulations on your soft plastic red WE500. I like the numbers card a lot!

[Kenny C]

I LOVE it. I am getting it for a great price too

[finlover]

OH MAMA--those colored AE40s have got my number!!!

[Doug Rose]

My one and only.  I'm a fool for a phone with vents.  Recently outfitted with a genuine Extensicord, still looking for information or photos of original AE40 line/mounting cords (see referenced thread)...baby could use a cord.

http://www.classicrotaryphones.com/forum/index.php?topic=3414.0

Absolutely stunning! What is the story behind it? Did you reurb this? Breathtaking....Doug

[easytiger]

My one and only.  I'm a fool for a phone with vents.  Recently outfitted with a genuine Extensicord, still looking for information or photos of original AE40 line/mounting cords (see referenced thread)...baby could use a cord.

http://www.classicrotaryphones.com/forum/index.php?topic=3414.0

Absolutely stunning! What is the story behind it? Did you reurb this? Breathtaking....Doug

Thanks, Doug...although, other than recognizing its virtues and some recent attention to a detail or two, it's pretty much the way I found it.

I bought it at a vintage shop in the Mountain West when I was a struggling college student 20 years ago.  I grew up in a very remote small town in Mountain Bell/Western Electric territory.  I'd never seen anything like it, but I knew it was..."special".  I forget the price – other than it was more than I had.  I think probably somewhere moderately over $100 or so.  I know I went without a couple meals and a tank of gas or two or something to swing it at the time.

I had no idea what a Automatic Electric was.  Growing up, everyone I knew had the standard WE 500 or 554 - except one fancy family in town who had a Princess, and one lady with a funny-lookin' blue phone I now know was a stowaway AE80 (where that came from in remote Western Electric territory I have no idea!)

It's moved many times with me – including across the country.  It's always worked, except for my chronic struggles with the rattle of a ring it always had.  Finding this forum a couple months ago, I learned it had a frequency ringer of course (something else about which I had no idea).  So, save the recent straight-line ringer and Extensicord replacement, and addition of the pick-up bar, she remains as she always was.  It has what I believe is a WE line/mounting cord, so that's my next replacement to tackle.

Never out to have "a collection", back in those college days I found myself picking-up sets I found in thrift stores and garage sales here and there (hard-luck $7.00 Princesses or low-ball 302's, etc.) – just things I liked or that were outside of my growing-up experience.  My friends thought I was crazy, of course... sorta  like the Barbara Mandrell "I Was Country When Country Wasn't Cool" story...http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NN50ZU6jVwM

Now I'm finding some gems (although needing attention) in 20 year old storage boxes that I forgot I even had that will be some good Winter projects to get (as Matchbox 20 would say) "Back 2 Good" .  In the mix a ivory 354 (vents!), a black Princess, and a beat-up 1937 manual metal 302 that has all the elements including the rear hand hold vents!  Who knew!?   Did I mention I'm a fool for vents? 

I'm most drawn to the designs of the AE40 or 302/354 era – designs that have some actual architectural elements in them. 

Wow, I'm sorry... I got off in the weeds.  Somewhere in there is my Red Phone story...

[JorgeAmely]

Easytiger:

Mine has a 1954 black rubber WE cord. From the Steve Hilsz collection. For convenience, I added a 283B plug. I keep it in the lower shelf of a bookcase, away from bright sunlight and fluorescent lamps.

[Doug Rose]

I go back and forth, which one do I like better, the Ivory or the Red. Sorry DEAD HEAT. These are two of the most amazing phones I have ever seen. You both should be very proud. I am a tad envious, but just a tad! Great phones....Doug

[AE_Collector]

Hey, you guys have posted pictures of my entire colored 40 collection...a red one and an Ivory one. Only problem is that, as usual, yours blow mine out of the water...but I love them all the same.

Easytiger: I'd go for a black cloth 3 conductor AE cord for your red 40 since it is a black (isn't it?) ExtensiCord on the handset. I'm sure you can get a very nice "new" AECo cloth cord from Old phone Works (that's who is making Odis cords now isn't it?).

Of course you will then be looking for a black bakelite AECo mounting block for the end of the cord!

Terry

[easytiger]

Jorge:  I keep the red 40 right out in the room with me!  Especially after all those years without a straight-line, I like to hear her ring proper now.  Agreed,  no sun or fluorescents, though.

Checking further, the current line/mounting cord has no Western Electric or date markings on the retainers, so I guess maybe not a WE cord after all, but it sure looks like WE.  Nice fat black pliable rubber - long with red, green and yellow leads.  It's a good cord...it just seems a little out of place.

Terry:   Thanks for the suggestion...black cloth seems right.  I think Bingster also alluded to cloth probably being a more symmetrical pairing with the Extensicord in the original thread with my AE cord question.

P.S.  anybody have a black bakelite AECo mounting block? (Thanks alot, Terry!) 

[JorgeAmely]

A mounting block like this?