Extensions to pay phones? [Telecom]

Lisa or Jeff · 2011-08-13T21:07:24+00:00

At an old-phone show today, someone had a sign tellings callers of apay phone to listen first before depositing money; this was to ensurethe line wasn't in use.Years ago, it was common for a small business, such as a luncheonette,gas station, barbershop, etc. to have a pay phone with an extensionattached to it. The extension did not have a dial. In this way thepay phone could serve both customers and the business. If the phonerang, the business could answer it on the extension if desired.Would anyone know more about that arrangement? Is it still in use?(I checked a lunchonette that had it and they got rid of their payphone.)P.S. At the hotel hosting the phone show, there was a bank of alcovesalong a wall obviously once containing pay phones. All gone. Theonly pay phones there were on sale at the show, and they weren'tcheap.(I picked up an AE 40 and an AE Touch Tone for myself--AE did theirown designs and didn't license W/E patents the way SC and ITT did.)***** Moderator's Note *****My dad used to take me to a barbershop in South Boston when I was akid, and the owner had an extension phone like that. It was anordinary wall set, and the barber used to keep a calendar beside it:whenever he wanted to make a call, he would hit the calendar and thendial the call.When I looked behind the calendar, I saw wires going into the phone:each with bare ends, and one almost touching the other. It wasn'tuntil I had been at N.E.T. for a few years that I realized that thebarber was slapping the calendar to short the ring lead to ground anddraw dialtone, so he could make calls without putting a dime in thepay phone.Bill HorneModerator

Aug 13, 2011 25 Replies

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John F. Morse 15 years ago

Thanks for the link to that site, Scott.

On the outside it looks like the 1A2 coin set. Probably some internal improvements were made, incrementing the designation letter.

I don't remember if the 1A1/1A2 could provide dialtone first or not. I was not around pay phone installation after 1970.

What was the WECo designation for the late three-slot coin sets that were replaced by the 1A1/1A2 sets around the end of the '60s? Perhaps a 635?

My guess, for their choosing the use of a coin set as an extension, was their C.O. may have only provided 1FB, or other loop-start lines, and the "coin" set therefore required an ability to "play dead" until a coin was inserted.

Or this could be one of those customer-owned coin sets on a 1FB line. A friend installed one in his restaurant and had the SWBT 1A2 removed.

Or they didn't want the ticket seller to make free calls and tie up the line. ;-)

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T 15 years ago

In article , snipped-for-privacy@panix.com says... We had that at a garage I worked in. The phone did, in fact, have

I have in my posession a 1990's Qwest 1D2 payphone. You're right, when the coin drops down it trips a little switch and sets one of the relays on the control board.

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T 15 years ago

The 1C2 was the next to the last in CO controlled pay phones made by Western Electric.

I have a 1D2, here's a pic of the guts:

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The only key difference I know of between a 1C2 and 1D2 is the totalizer. On the former it's a very electromechanical beast, whereas on the latter it just uses a little sensor board to detect the coins and relay that on to the logic board.

In the below picture you can see the sensor board clearly on the coin mechanism:

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Marc Haber 15 years ago

In Germany, Telcos are desperately trying to phase out ISDN since the vendors of CO equipment have announced the EOL of the associated hardware.

Grüße Marc

-------------------------------------- !! No courtesy copies, please !! ----- Marc Haber | " Questions are the | Mailadresse im Header Mannheim, Germany | Beginning of Wisdom " |

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by Nature | Lt. Worf, TNG "Rightful Heir" | Fon: *49 621 72739834

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