atcomsystems.ca/forum Forums Other TDM Phone Systems Antique Telephones Western Electric 500 C/D to RJ11 conversion

I bought my wife a Western Electric rotary phone for Christmas and she wants to actually use it as one of our house phones. The phone appears to be in good condition, but the cord has been cut off at the end. I can tell the cord has three conductors (red, yellow, green) and I am wondering what would be the best way to adapt this to an RJ11 connection.
[img]<a href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/19821942@N00/6607817269/" title="DSC04514 by hdwilson33, on Flickr"><img src="https://farm8.staticflickr.com/7031/6607817269_3bdd13515b.jpg" width="500" height="406" alt="DSC04514"></a>[/img]
[img]<a href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/19821942@N00/6607817109/" title="DSC04510 by hdwilson33, on Flickr"><img src="https://farm8.staticflickr.com/7021/6607817109_1b34cd9d09.jpg" width="438" height="500" alt="DSC04510"></a>[/img]

Change the cord to a modular one.

No, no, no, why make a nice antique worth less? The junk bins are filled with otherwise valuable non-modular phones from the 50's and 60's that have been notched and otherwise butchered.

Strip the black sheathing back an inch or so, and strip the mounting cord leads. The conductors are tinsel, so be careful. Take the red tinsel conductor and wrap it carefully around one screw in the connecting block. Take the green and the yellow tinsel conductors and carefully wrap them, together, around another screw terminal. Then take the red jack lead and match it up with the red cord lead, and tighten the screw. Take the green jack lead and do the same on a screw with the green/yellow leads. Screw the cover down. Use a modular mounting cord to go from this assembly to the wall jack in your house.

I know POTS (a vanishing thing in NY) supports pulse dial but does FIOS. My Vonage ATA does not and my previous Cable Modem did not.

My point is unless you have POTS (plain old telephone service) the phone may not be able to dial out, will still ring and answer fine.

Yes, FiOS will support rotary. I have FiOS at home and have been able to place calls using a 1980s vintage Western Electric 500 telephone. I can also call out when I switch our AT&T/Lucent 962 & 965 telephones from TT to rotary.

Arthur, changing the cord OR installing that piece of crapola on the end of the cord will still devalue the phone.

Go to www.sandman.com/telhist.html and scroll to near the bottom of the page. You want a "Modular Retrofit Plug"

You have several options including purchasing;
insulation piercing, telephone spade-lugs (a) from Rat-Shack and crimping them onto the ends of the cut-off conductors.
Taking a regular modular connector and cutting off the plug on one end and then crimping on the spade-lugs.
Purchasing a half-modular (b) line-cord, i.e., modular plug on one end and spade-lugs on the other.
A simple eBay or Google search will reveal a number of suppliers for these products, including-

(a) https://tinyurl.com/885wjpn
Telephone Spade Lugs (24-Pack), Catalog #: 64-3070, $2.09
(b) https://tinyurl.com/6wmouas or https://tinyurl.com/7hwmh8h
Half-modular Line Cord (Ace Hardware, eBay and other suppliers)
https://tinyurl.com/6tm8f8w
Modular retro-fit phone Plug adapters

Ok, this is my rookie project, but I think I can handle the cord swap out. After cracking the case, I can tell that the cord is not the 1958 original, as the internal wiring has all cloth insulation. If I have a working phone and a happy wife, it'll be worth the $20 I paid for it.

My only question is that since I have a 3 insulator cord, I don't know where to put the black wire. I can easily replace the green, yellow, and red where the existing spade ends are now. (Top right in the below image).

[img]<a href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/19821942@N00/6615949545/" title="DSC04522 by hdwilson33, on Flickr"><img src="https://farm8.staticflickr.com/7154/6615949545_929356eda3.jpg" width="500" height="375" alt="DSC04522"></a>[/img]

Thanks for all the help so far.

Insulate & store it.