sundance-communications.com/forum Forums General General Telephone & Systems Information Answering Machine Problem

The reason you got such a variation of ring voltage is the Digital multimeter. It takes a 'sample' and then shows what it got. The sample is so quick it can get the measurement during the rise or fall of the ringing sine wave! It could actually take a sample when the sine is crossing the zero line and you'd get 0 volts ringing. Analog meter is always easier to use when measuring ac voltage. Confusion factor!
And most meters are calibrated are calibrated for 60 Htz. Ringing is normally 20 Htz. What should read as 90-110 volts will read as approximately 70 volts. Another confusion factor!
One more thing, if the answering machine has an REN of 0.0, it will never answer, as that indicates no ringer load and not arranged to answer the phone. You may have 2 REN's quoted. one will end with an 'A' and the other will end with a 'B'. One indicates mechanical ringer, the other indicates electronic ringer. (I never can remember which is which)
So now that I've added to the your confusion, I'll crawl back in my hole. John C. (Not Garand)

Lightninghore: Thank you for the information.

I did use a digital RMS Multimeter. It does not plot out the sine waves so I just took many measurements and picked the highs and the lows. So are you saying that a high measurement using a digital multimeter of 77 VAC for the ring voltage is really 90-110 VAC and thus my ring voltage is not low?

I have two answering machines to test with. One of them has a REN of 0.0B and the other one (brand new) has a REN of 0.2B. Both do not ring on my phone line but do work. I am not sure why the one shows 0.0B but it says that on the bottom and also in the FCC registration number.

Now my DSL connection is starting to act up. It disconnects and then re-connects. When it does this my phone cuts out completely.
I called the phone company and they are sending someone out this Thursday. Will wait and see. I think whatever is happening is on their end and it is getting worse.

Well the phone tech was to come out Thursday but did not.
Now the phone company has them scheduled to come out Saturday.

The tech came out and also measured the ring voltage on the line at the DEMARC and got an even lower number than I did.

After some measurements the tech then went out to where the phone lines come into the neighborhood across the street and switched the pair of wires going to my building to another pair.

That fixed the problem. Answering machine works and DSL is now stable.

Thanks to everyone for help on this matter.

Thanks for getting back to us with the end result. Always nice to know that it all worked out & why.

Dave