>> snipped-for-privacy@aol.com wrote:
>>> >>>> Someone mentioned Bell using jet engines for central office power
>>>> backup. I'm kind of surprised at this. The electric companies use
>>>> them for summer supplements. They are very expensive to run, but can
>>>> get up to speed very quickly. I believe the phone companies use more
>>>> conventional diesel engines to power generators. If there is a power
>>>> failure, central office battery has enough capacity to keep things
>>>> going for a while, more than enough time to power up a diesel engine.
>>>> The jet engine has the advantage of being smaller.)
>>> Every "emergency engine" I ever saw in a telephone building was a
>>> conventional diesel engine. My father-in-law was shop foreman for a
>>> company that sold and service large earth moving equipment in Enid,
>>> Oklahoma, and from time to time they were called upon to routine the
>>> auto-start emergency engine in the Enid c.o. It was a conventional GM
>>> diesel engine like those used on earth moving equipment and
>>> locomotives.
>> [snip]
>> New England Telephone went with turbine-powered alternators in the
>> large Boston-area buildings, most with capacities far in excess of
>> what was required for the C.O. itself: the unit at Back Bay was rated >> at 2500 KW.
>> If I had to guess, I'd say they got a good deal because Allison and
>> other turbine manufacturers were selling the aeronautical power units
>> that they had stockpiled during the Vietnam war.
>> The power technicians didn't like them, because they were a major
>> change from the diesel units, but they could power a small city and
>> they were, as I said, used to generate power for the commerical grid
>> during summer peak load periods.
>> Suburban offices with more modest needs remained on diesel.
>> William Warren
>> (Filter noise from my address for direct replies)
> I'm not certain but I think one is also on the PVDRIWADS02 switching
> center, except that it isn't on the roof but built between the old and
> new buildings. I've heard it on several occasions and it does sound
> like a chopper at idle.
> [TELECOM Digest Editor's Note: I am reminded of the old 'Kenwood Bell'
> (Illinois Bell's Chicago-Kenwood central office in its crossbar
> switching days) at 61st and Kenwood Avenue on a hot summer evening
> many years ago. With all the windows open (air conditioning was not
> yet invented, I do not think) you could hear that thing at least a
> block or two away down the street as you walked up to and past the > property. PAT]
Unfortunately for me I've never heard a live electromechanical switch. It was a delight testing my recent acquisition, two WE 551C KSU's. Connecting the A to A1 leads gives a nice thunk of relays engaging and the light for the card illuminates. Now I just have to apply ring voltage and see if the interrupter still works.
But I never got to hear things like Panel which existed in my city until I was 7 years old, but I was unaware of it.
Did get to hear a call processing through a noisy #5 Xbar though when we moved into North Providence and ended up with a Pawtucket rate center number. Even that cut to a #5/2000 ESS just before I moved back to Providence.