atcomsystems.ca/forum Forums Other TDM Phone Systems 1A2 and Comkey Telephones & Systems A little bit of insight on 1A2 for the "younguns"

To give you younger folks an idea of the knowledge, time, and labor involved with working on 1A2 equipment here is something to think about. It was very common for it to take most of the morning to install two telephones on an existing system to be connected to existing CO lines. This was not because we were lazy either.

To install two 5 line telephones ( 2564/5 sets ) you had to run two 25-pair cables and terminate them on existing 66 blocks or install new blocks if the spares had been used.
At least 1.5 hours depending upon the length of the cables.

Then you had to terminate a 25-pair Amphenol connector on the telephone end of each cable. 5 Minutes each if you were experienced enough and had a nice lunch date planned with the cute little civilian woman from building 13, otherwise about 15 minutes each. Why hurry? LoL

Then you had to locate the desired CO lines and figure out the best way to include the new phones into the daisy chain WITHOUT killing service to existing telephones for any length of time if possible. Depending upon how many telephones the line was connected to this could be a 2 minute task or up to 30 minutes.
This was repeated for each line.

Next you had to figure how to make the desired lines, ( and only the desired lines ) to ring on the telephones. This also could be a 5 minute task or up to 30 minutes or longer. And in some cases it was simply impossible to set it up precisely the way the customer wanted because of the common audible wiring. In those cases you got it as close as possible. This was usually not a problem for me as an installer because the surveyor had explained this to the customer in advance.

Finally, each line had to be tested at each phone, the phones labeled, the workorder signed, and the equipment room cleaned and secured.

Keep in mind that in the above scenario all of the lines were already installed on the system.
If new lines were to be installed it would definitely mean returning after lunch.
In that case you would have to test pairs to the building with the CO ( inside plant ) test board, install a new line card ( 400D ) in the 584 panel if there was an available slot, then connect the CO line to the telephones.

But with all of the headaches and effort…. It was so nice at the end of the day to know you earned your every bit of your pay.

Bobby, you sound like an old gov't employee.

Why go all the way to Bldg 13 to get that lunch date --- the TOC for the building used to always be the new "girl" and was always the one right out of school and young, good looking, and was always impressed with the way a phone guy could get things done.

Yep, a day in the life of a 1A2 installer --- walls of panels floor to 14 foot ceiling, 30 - 40 feet long closet, need a step ladder to run jumpers. The install was always were there are no pairs left, have to run new feeders, add extenders so the lamps and buzzers would work, yeah, a real fun day.

Oh, yes, a stroll down memory lane -----

KLD

LoL Yep,I was in the Air Force 4 years.

How about the 2833 model phones with 50 pr. to each, connected to 580 ksu's. I still have bulb puller, file for contacts and some of those strange fuses around here.

You are so right jacktel! I just didn't want to scare anyone off. I remember running 75 and 100 pair cables for a single telephone back then.

I am a younger tech and never got to work on a 1A2 system, kind of wish I did, seems like the experince you pick up is priceless..I know their are a few pictures already on the board but if anyone has some shots of a full closet I would love to see them..running 100 pair for a single line...WOW!

Single set anthonyh, Call Directors w/busy lamp field and button and buzzers, lots of wiring, you'd stack the button pads next to the phone. They attached to the set on a mounting bracket. Also had to wire the other sets for the busy lamps by putting diodes in them to make the field work. Boy did the Government like buttons and buzzers, even after dial up intercom had been out for a long time.

The wire is still in the buildings, mostly just cut to bundles above newer systems installed later.Was in old bank last month and looking at floorplan for bid of new cable v&d, the new tenent's IT guy was looking at 75 pr. cable heads with rj11 jacks attached via a splice. We went into basement and EQ. was still there. This not unusual they just put newer system on different wall and ran jumpers to old terminal blocks on original eq. side to get to old cables.

anthonyh, I did not take any pictures of the equipment rooms back then because of security reasons. But I will try to locate some for you on the net to give you an example.

Anthonyh, The 1a2 systems depending on size were ok, but just imagine someone spilling a coke into a phone on the third floor of a large building and knocking out assorted lines on every floor. You as tech had to find and isolate it. Today you could drop phone in bucket of water and maybe lose port on system.PS those assorted lines would be knocked out on every phone in building