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The Old Test


Eric
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First car telephone systems:

WESTERN ELECTRIC 238 and 239 EQUIPMENT AND 41A CONTROL HEAD 

The Western Electric house-made equipment consisted of two pieces; the transmitter cabinet and the receiver cabinet. These mounted in the automobile trunk, and a large cable brought forward under the carpet connected to a "control head" under the dash which contained a telephone handset. The control head featured two illuminated lenses--one indicated that the equipment was turned on, and the other would illuminate when the mobile telephone was called. The Western Electric Type 38 was Highway band equipment, i.e. VHF low band, and the Type 39 equipment was Urban, or VHF high band equipment. A complete installation would be prefixed "2"; in other words, type 238 would be a complete Highway mobile telephone, and type 239 a complete Urban mobile telephone. As originally supplied, all equipment was single channel in operation although two channel expansion was possible.

WE238.JPG

https://www.wb6nvh.com/MTSfiles/Carphone1.htm

High voltage for the tubes was from a Dynamotor (motor generator) in the engine compartment.  In use, it was a HUGE drain on the battery.

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2 hours ago, Paul53 said:

Before my folks passed, theirs was so old that new repairmen would knock and ask if they could look at it, take it apart, etc. All mechanical, not a single transistor. They just wanted to be able to see a real one.

phone wiki.JPG

My mom has acouple of these.  Two weeks ago, I unplugged it to pack for the move.  She had to use other modern phones to call out, but her dial phone rang and worked for incoming calls.  If you have one, plug it in and watch your friends jump when it rings.  Do a Matrix type response.  

She also has a few candlesticks.  

Edited by Rellik
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