Advice needed: restoring old military fie;d telephone

[Benproof]

This is probably crazy. I bought an old WWII field telephone. Looks like one of these:

They use large cells - this one has corroded and need to be taken out. There is no number dial set, so I've no idea how to operate these!

There is a large mechanical bell which looks great, as well as the telephone and cable. Looks like the telephone needs to be plugged into the power socket for some reason.

Well I was wondering if it's possible to try and convert this to use as a domestic telephone line (!) to fit my industrial lounge. It'd be great to get that mechanical bell ringing for incoming calls. How to dial without a number pad is another thing though.

Any advice welcome!

 

[GHT]

That phone is in amazingly good condition. Sorry I can't give you the advice that you are looking for. If you have ever seen such phones in war films, you will remember that instead of dialling, the operator wound a handle at the side see here.
Are you into re-enactment? If so, you will know about The War & Peace Revival. It's a once a year, massive military show. Among other things, are 200 plus trader tents. There will always be someone there who could help you, so if you haven't found out by next year, get yourself along to W & P.
One other thought occurred to me. My landline phone is actually my first ever phone after I got married, in 1968. A phone engineer, has put some modern wizardry in it for me and now it not only works, it's a great talking point when visitors call. Do you know any such expert?

 

[Benproof]

Thanks GHT

I've got two phones ...apparently you need two, since they were designed to be used short range (well...360 miles..! via a telephone operator to connect on the field).

Someone showed me this page! http://www.artofmanliness.com/2012/06/21/wwii-field-phone-bluetooth/

That looks fascinating...I might give it a try lol.

Thanks for the link to the renactment site ...it looks fascinating! Never heard of it although July 2016 feels like a long way off lol. I like the idea of an authentic field telephone, so when friends and family come, they won't know how to dial out lol.

The website indicates, that I will need to strip out the battery; insert a power booster circuit to get the power up.

I was thinking it might be easier to thread a bakelite analogue handset through the field telephone box (mine is in military khaki). One of my neighbours is an electrician so I can ask him, although I can see his heart sink at the weirdness of this cool idea

Thanks

 

[hatsRme]

I happened to have found a gentleman in my area who has a huge reputation with old tube radios, military radios, and lots and lots (and lots!) of clocks.


Ross Hochstrasser is terrific person with the technical wherewithal to fix about any old radio device. He's not quick, but very, VERY good at what he does.

 

[Benproof]

Just look at his shop! He's like a hardcore ham radio operator in there!

Sadly it'd cost the same as the field telephone to post over to the USA from the UK, just to get him to look at .. and then the cost back...that's before it gets intercepted by customs as some kind of dodgy spy telephone before they realise it's from the 1940s

Great to know guys like Ross are working away with these superb vintage phones. They don't make them like they used to. Will get through 20 smartphones before this packs in, once I get it working of course

 

[ingineer]

Wow no information at at all
Is it a ee-8?
Most of that phone is just useless to you except the handset which can be used as modern "carbon" transceiver
run the handset thorough a old school rotatory hidden some where.
Touch tone is no a problem with a hidden TT pad
Ringer is the hard part' an outboard bell required
73 and good luck