New Learner

[Millertime]

I am about to take the plunge and learn how to restore retro/vintage phones now that I have reached my mid life crisis. Can someone advise me on what things I should be looking out for when I make my first purchase? For example, what would be an ideal phone to work on? I was looking at a very nice retro looking Siemens rotary phone in green that went for £5 but I was out bid at the last minute.

All help welcome

[Radio Wrangler]

A couple of bits of general advice.

1) Find something not very valuable and as common as muck to start on then you can try various techniques and if the worst happens your pocket doesn't take a hit and a bit of history isn't lost.

2) On line auctions are a good place to SELL things if you want the highest price because they are effectively marketed across a huge spread of people and it only takes two who must have one for them to rev each other's prices up. THey are a good place to look if you are looking for something difficult to find and are prepared to pay for it. Bargains can be rare.

3) Car boot sales are a good place to look because the likelihood of a specialist on the prowl for rarities is low and the vendors often see things as junk.

4) Amateur radio rallies often have club stalls with boxes and boxes of 'junk' and one man's junk is another man's treasure. At these events known amateur radio equipment fetches decent prices, as do specialist components, but everything else is dirt cheap. There may not be what you're looking for there, but then there may. Rotary phones and such stuff can get given away at the end by stall holders not really fancying the job of re-loading the stuff in their car. Look in the boxes under the tables. Because of the re-loading syndrome, prices drop at the end. There is an art in finding some heavy 'boat anchor' earlier in the day and popping back to see if it's still there at the end.... effectively a Dutch auction!

There are plenty of threads on this site on restoring and using all sorts of phones, have a dig.

David

[dagskarlsen]

Hi, and welcome.
Davids answers are very good, so I will just fill out with something more.

When you buy a telephone, you will never know how much, or often little you have to do to get it in working order.

The UK telephone systems usually use a 3rd wire for the ringer, this may give a need for smaller modifications of e.g. N.American, or Norwegian ... telephones.

Not all systems understands the signals from a rotary telephone anymore

I have bought some fine telephones from e.g. eBay, but some has also been found on the trash.

The telephone restoration may be motivated of pretty different ideas.
I like to do this, to learn, and get things working. Some are more interested in the look and finish, some focus on originality, date matching of parts etc.

My primary goal are a telephone who looks as it would after some years of careful use, working pretty good, and if possible as original as I may get it, but the process are the most interesting part.

dsk

[Millertime]

Thanks for the tips and advice.

At the moment, I just want to get to grips with the component side of things and to get the things working. Cosmetics will come later. Are there companies that sell spare parts? For example, if I bought and phone and the plastic dial was missing or damaged, would it be easy(ish) to get a suitable part?

Again thanks for the help.

[ThePillenwerfer]

There are plenty of spares available. Just type "GPO spares" into Google.

Good luck with your endeavours but be warned: it's addictive.

- Joe