UK Vintage Radio Repair and Restoration Discussion Forum - View Single Post - A question about overhead phone-lines.

G6Tanuki · 5th Jul 2019, 4:44 pm

Some fascinating observations: yes indeed the setup at my parents' house was a party-line - as well as the 2-core cable from the pole to the insulator on the house there was an earth-connection to a rod outside the lounge window. This was made in uninsulated twisted-strand copper wire and over the years acquired quite a few 'bodge' repairs using choc-block type connectors after various gardening accidents.

The overhead cable was black and like a rectangle-with-rounded-off-corners in cross-section, - like the sort of cable used on modern table-lamps - and it was looped round the upper flange of the insluator then bound with what looked like black PVC-coated single-core wire.

It was later replaced some time in the 1970s by the more-modern grey "figure-of-8" type that was tied-off to the metal insulator-bracket using one of the twirly pigtail things. By that time we'd gone from party-line to dedicated line - I guess concurrently with the exchange-upgrade that took us from 4- to 6-digit phone numbers?

5th Jul 2019, 4:44 pm	#14
G6Tanuki Dekatron Join Date: Apr 2012 Location: Wiltshire, UK. Posts: 13,998	Re: A question about overhead phone-lines. Some fascinating observations: yes indeed the setup at my parents' house was a party-line - as well as the 2-core cable from the pole to the insulator on the house there was an earth-connection to a rod outside the lounge window. This was made in uninsulated twisted-strand copper wire and over the years acquired quite a few 'bodge' repairs using choc-block type connectors after various gardening accidents. The overhead cable was black and like a rectangle-with-rounded-off-corners in cross-section, - like the sort of cable used on modern table-lamps - and it was looped round the upper flange of the insluator then bound with what looked like black PVC-coated single-core wire. It was later replaced some time in the 1970s by the more-modern grey "figure-of-8" type that was tied-off to the metal insulator-bracket using one of the twirly pigtail things. By that time we'd gone from party-line to dedicated line - I guess concurrently with the exchange-upgrade that took us from 4- to 6-digit phone numbers?