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question:should a magneto phone ring its own bells when cranked?

Started by shadow67, January 27, 2017, 08:49:37 AM

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shadow67

I have two old magneto phones that I have strung a wire between and they work. When the crank is turned on either one, it rings the other phone as well as its own bells. Talking between the phones is fine also. I thought this was normal until reading a couple of articles stating that when the crank is turned, only the far end phone's bells should ring and the phone's own bells should remain silent. It says that if your own bells ring then the wiring has been modified. So I was wondering if my phones may be wired incorrectly since the phones' own bells ring when cranked. They look all original, and I have a couple other magneto phones that also ring their own bells when cranked. It seems odd that all of them have been modified, but maybe so. What do you all think?
thanks!

the photos show what I have connected together, a W.E. and a Sumter Telephone, working great

LarryInMichigan

On every magneto set I have seen, the local ringer rings when the magneto is cranked.  If it didn't, the caller wouldn't be sure that their magneto was generating a voltage.

Larry

Jack Ryan

Most magneto phones ring their own bell when cranked. Some are configurable so you can choose to have your own bell ring or not. A few don't ring their own bell.

I think whoever wrote that only had one magneto phone and it didn't ring its own bell (by design or by fault) and he assumed that was normal.

Jack

shadow67

thanks so much for the replies! I love using these and watching my 7 and 10 yr old kids use them. They also know how to use a rotary phone  :)

poplar1

I believe that Kellogg wall magneto phones do not ring their own bells. There is an extra contact on the hand generator that disconnects the ringer. Western Electric phones, on the other hand, don't have this third terminal for disconnecting the ringer.

It's possible to swap two wires on the Kellogg generator terminals if you want your own phone to ring when cranking.

The definition of a phone "working" for many antique dealers is that the bells ring when you turn the crank!
"C'est pas une restauration, c'est une rénovation."--François Martin.

War Horse

An excellent, excellent question.

I thought for sure that they all did, but then I followed the link here in the forums about making a wooden phone work with today's CO battery.  In that guy's article it says specifically that if the bells ring when you crank then your phone is wired wrong.  I was completely like what the heck, I thought I checked all the wires!  Of course I didn't stick a meter on them to trace, just eyeballed it.  That's good to hear that WECo phones are suppose to ring their own bells.

dsk

This is a good question, in the very beginning they tested out series, parallel etc to find whats working, the generator (or inductor) did 2steal" the signals, and got a switch pretty early, and higher and higher resistance of the ringer came, much of the same reason, but also to be more sensitive to weak ringing signals. Here in Norway it became a standard in 1918 to have a button on the phone with 2 functions, it cut out own ringer when held down, and it shorted out the induction coil, so the phone was listen only.  In 1934 we got a new anti sidetone telephone, and this had automatic switching ringer out, generator in when cranking. (The older phones was left in service until they did not do the job, or automatic exchanges took over. (Where I now live in 1968)

dsk

Dan/Panther


The More People I meet, The More I Love, and MISS My Dog.  Dan Robinson

unbeldi

The correct answer to this question is:  It all depends...

Telephone companies used various types of signaling systems, using differing technical philosophies and having differing technical requirements. The answer to this is buried in the historical developments of the technology.

A general widely employed principle in the development of telephone service was that customers should not have to perform extra tasks in addition to the most basic actions intuitively required to make a telephone call, and that they did not need to understand the internal workings of the apparatus.  This is widely expressed not only in the documents of AT&T and Western Electric, but also in the independent historical handbooks of telephony, Kempster Miller (1933) is a good one, for example.

Based on history, it really is not necessary that users hear the bells ringing when operating the generator.  The expectation of reliable service was that the operator answers with a query for a number or name.  The user did not need to know whether a current was generated and many did not understand the concept of electricity anyways, until some point in time. Technically, the local bell represented an additional load on the already heavily loaded line reducing efficiency, but by the historical thinking and methodology, this could not be avoided initially.

The first ringing systems did ring all bells on the line when any one of the subscribers operated the generator. This was initially unavoidable because ringers and generators were wired in series, not only at one station, but along the entire line. To ease the load on the line, the generators had an automatic shunt to short-circuit the generator when not in use.  In the 1890s or so, John Carty pointed out that this was all wrong and invented bridged wiring in which each ringer as well as the generator were connected from one line wire to ground for divided ringing or across both line wires where metallic ringing was in use. By the 1910s this had become the standard wiring method in the industry.

When studying only Western Electric equipment in hind-sight, it may seem that local ringers should always sound when the magneto is operated. Indeed, the WECo circuits do not provide any other wiring option. Despite Carty's invention, the Bell System's magneto signaling as well as their frequency ringing systems actually remained the most primitive and fault-prone, quickly eclipsed by the independent manufacturers' designs.

As a result many of the magneto telephone sets of the independent makers can be configured either way.  This was in general known as the "Universal Circuit", which provided options for silent ringer operation, for divided ringing, and metallic ringing.

Today, in a collection display, I find it very annoying to have the local bell ringing when operating the magneto, because it prevents me from hearing the other sets on the demonstration magneto line.  It is much more interesting to hear the other sets respond.  Just last year I found an unmolested Leich magneto set which was wired for silent ringer operation.





Sargeguy

QuoteWhen studying only Western Electric equipment in hind-sight, it may seem that local ringers should always sound when the magneto is operated. Indeed, the WECo circuits do not provide any other wiring option. Despite Carty's invention, the Bell System's magneto signaling as well as their frequency ringing systems actually remained the most primitive and fault-prone, quickly eclipsed by the independent manufacturers' designs.

The Western Electric TYPE 44 was an early box that featured a shunt button for silent signalling.  Also many early New England Telephone sets were equipped with shunts, many of them used early Bell licensee and WE components.
Greg Sargeant
Providence, RI
TCI /ATCA #4409

unbeldi

Quote from: Sargeguy on January 27, 2017, 05:36:48 PM
The Western Electric TYPE 44 was an early box that featured a shunt button for silent signalling.  Also many early New England Telephone sets were equipped with shunts, many of them used early Bell licensee and WE components.

Probably also designed by Carty; He came from Boston and the NETT company before joining WECo.  He held a large collection of patents for telephone signaling in that period.

PS: I can certainly envision switching arrangements on the hand generator that would shunt the ringer in a series circuit automatically just as well.  Later generators had a variety of switch configurations, but not those commonly found by WECo.

Doug Rose

I had a Kellogg Wall phone that the the gongs rang when the Magneto was cranked, BUT only when it was straight up, lying down it would not ring.

http://www.classicrotaryphones.com/forum/index.php?topic=17193.msg177464#msg177464

I have had WE boxes that do the same, ring when straight up, but not flat.

I think they should have rang or how else did you know you were calling "Sara".....Doug
Kidphone

unbeldi

Quote from: Doug Rose on January 27, 2017, 06:46:21 PM
I think they should have rang or how else did you know you were calling "Sara".....Doug

The bells of a common battery set did not ring either when lifting the receiver.  The user had to wait for the answer by the operator.


dsk

I guess this will make some more comments, but from what they did teach here, we had 3 ways of wiring ringers;
1: bridged, wish rings "always".
2: Connected with switches shorting the part of the circuit witch not is in use. Designed by L.M.Ericsson.
3: Connected with switches changing between the parts of the circuit witch should be used. Designed by BELL

The switches are hook sw. and an automatic switch engaged by rotating the inductor (Generator)

I will guess this explanation is pretty simplified to what was the actual truth, but still enough for educating a common "telephone man".

Enclosed sketch:

dsk

Doug Rose

I walked around the phone room last night and cranked every magneto and magneto wall phone that I have. The gongs rang on all of them.

I am not sure if this is a true test as I would not know common battery form the common cold.  8)

This is in our kitchen, WE parts with a Couch tag. It rings...Doug
Kidphone