atcomsystems.ca/forum Forums Wiring - Telecom Carriers - Trunks & Services Telephone Repairs & Equipment trouble with trimline phone

I have a WE 10-button Trimline phone that the bell does not ring nor the handset will light up. Interestingly, to me anyway, there are five wires to the phone, the usual red, green, yellow, back, plus a white one. To test the light, I hooked up the yellow and black to the power supply, and red and green to tip and ring. Does the white wire have something to do with the ringer or lighted dial that I don't know about? Any help will be appreciated. Thanks.

Red goes to ring. Green goes to tip. Yellow is the ringer lead. It goes to ring (with the red lead) if you don't want the ringer to operate. It goes to tip (with the green lead) if you do want it to operate. Black and white go to 10Vac lamp supply.

Thanks, I tried it and it worked. Now, one minor glitch...I could not dial out with it, so I reversed the red and green wires at the jack and then everything was fine, but should I just leave them incorrectly reversed at the jack or go into the phone and unreverse them there?

the phone is polarity sensitive, everytime your provider reverses the leads on the way to your house you will have to switch the tip & ring wires. You can do it where ever it is easy for you since it's possible that could happen now and then.
Mark

I know some phones had the yellow wire as a ringer lead a long time ago, but when did they go to using white and black as the power leads in the Trimline? Didn't the Princess phones always have yellow and black as the power leads?

you could add a polarity guard like this if there isn't room in the phone you could wire it into the jack

Gentlemen:

Reverse the house wiring at the rear of the connection block to clear the problem on one set, or reverse the entire line at the NID to clear the problem in the whole house. I would not be so concerned that your LEC will reverse the line again, as long as no activity takes place due to a service order or repair request. Some people in my antique telephone collecting club (www.ATCAonline.com) who collect and operate these polarity-sensitive phones simply put a DPDT switch at the NID, and when the lunatics at the phone company reverse the line, they just go downstairs to the basement and throw the switch to the other position.

The White/Black wires have been used for the lamp since the advent of the (non-modular) Trimline in the 1960's. The Princess phone, which predates the Trimline, used Yellow/Black for the lamp for a short period. The first Princesses (the "A" models) were not equipped with a ringer, so 4 wires were sufficient. When the next generation of Princesses (the "B" models) arrived, equipped with internal ringers, the necessity for a 5th lead became an issue, and the Yellow lead was assigned for the ringer for uniformity across the entire family of x500- and x700-series phones.

The polarity guard must be installed inside the set, after the ringer. It will not pass ringing current, (since it is a full-wave bridge, it will rectify it, and the ringer, being an A-C device, will not operate) so it cannot be used external to the set.

Don't put one outside the phone, unless you want to come back here and ask us again why the bell isn't ringing.

The original Princess phones had a lead weight installed in the area of the phone where the ringer should have been. The phone was invented before the ringer that would eventually fit inside. When field forces disconnected "A" series Princesses, and the sets were sent back to WE to have ringers installed, there was a cottage industry at the field level of removing the lead weights, which found their way into fishing tackle boxes and Pinewood Derby cars.

Our motto where we worked: "If the phone company doesn't stock it, you don't need it."

Hope this helps.

Thank you all for your interesting and sage advice. In this particular phone, the wires must have been reversed inside the phone because I used a polarity tester and it isn't a problem with the outside line. I have heard of phones being deliberately reversed inside so they could be used as "answer only" phones in public locales.

Tell us a little about this polarity tester, please. Make? Model #? How it works? Is it the one with the modular cord/jack and an LED or two?

Long story short! Managed to build up some trimlines from discards in the early '80s with brown base and back and white dial pad. Sold the heck out of them as ICE CREAM SANDWICH phones. Sold 'em for $20 which isn't much now but a lot back then! John C. (Not Garand)