atcomsystems.ca/forum Forums Other TDM Phone Systems 1A2 and Comkey Telephones & Systems 1A2 Project

You may remember from my post about station block layout that I rescued a 1A2 KSU from work a while back. I got tired of it sort of leaning against the side of my desk with some 66 blocks on the floor beside it and decided that it was time that it went back on a wall where it belongs. I've taken a few pictures of what I've mounted so far and now I put it to you for comments.

At first, I thought I'd leave the backboard unpainted since the KSU came with a nice dark green backboard and I had the color-coded pre-fab models for the 66 blocks. However, since I've seen it all on the wall I think the unpainted 3/4" ply needs to be gray.

I plan to run the station cables out from below the station blocks and up the right side of the board into a chase that runs all the way to the attic in my house. The left-most block on the red backboard will be for the diode matrix made out of a 66B-50 block and clips from a 66M-50. It will be white instead of gray. I'm waiting for a yellow backboard to show up on eBay for the intercom, but in the meantime I think I'll use the lower right block on the blue backboard for that.

The space that all this is mounted in is under my foyer stairs in the basement. It's not a perfect space since the water heater, furnace, gas meter and main water shut-off all live under there, but the easy attic access makes it very appealing. Also, the block wall means no searching for studs to attach the backboard to. Unfortunately, I am pretty much limited to a 4'x6' wall area and I've already used 4'x4'.

The main ground point for the house is the main water pipe, so I'll probably ground to that as it is really convenient.

After I get the cabling in here nailed down (not literally) I've got to find myself some 66E3-25's to terminate in each room of the house. I never expected my roommates to actually want key phones! :rolleyes:

The 584C panel was made by Stromberg-Carlson around 1980-1981. It's wired a little different than the 584C panel I have by ITT. I opted to use the S-C 584C instead of the ITT one only because the S-C was steel and looked more solid. Pin 18 of slot 13 is hard wired to B Batt and pin 18 on all the other slots is left unconnected. There are some other peculiarities that I haven't quite nailed down as well. So even though there are 3 intercom cards in the KSU, I can only use one. There are 10 400E line cards, but I'm only using 4 since that is all the dial tone I can provide from my Asterisk server. The Melco intercom is from 1979, making it the oldest piece in the system (except for the stations, the oldest is dated 11-69). The power supply is by Elgin.

I think that pretty much covers it. If you've read this far congratulations. Go get something to drink. :toast:

You can get additional intercoms working if you want to. It may require a little wire wrapping, but it can be done.

Also 3&18 should be "A" Battery & Ground, not "B" - otherwise the ICMs will have a hum on them.

Sometimes battery was lifted from those pins to allow Music on Hold to be installed on line cards.

Good luck on your project!


Sam

I'd have put the red backboard on top and the blue one immediately below it. That's how they are designed to be used. That way, there would be no need for the white mushroom boards at all. With the current setup, there's no way for the KSU tails to reach the blocks on the red board without crossing the plane of the jumpers, a no-no.

Of course, there may not be enough room for you to have done it that way. With that being said, it still looks mighty fine. There's nothing more professional than an installation using factory backboards. I sure wish everyone did.

I would probably have mounted the Melco intercom perpendicular to the rack instead of parallel, but only to conserve space. There's nothing wrong with it being the way that it is.

Your 66E3 blocks won't be a problem, as I have answered your PM already. As for the yellow backboard, you may be better off with a blue one and a can of spray paint. Yellow backboards were rare even when they were fully in production.

It looks nice. Post some pics when it is wired up

Bacially what ED said. Red top left, Yellow next to it, blue below, no white needed in your picture. If there was room I mounted the key system above the Red board and brought the cables straight down to the blocks.

Ed, looks like you can still get the yellow ones.
https://www.emersonnetworkpower.com/EnergySystems/pdf/plant-accessories/OSPDS-154900.pdf

Oh, you can certainly still buy them. There are just minimum ordering quantities from most manufacturers. It's hard to find suppliers that maintain a large inventory of them, especially the ones designed for 1A2 installations.

I think your idea of a can of spray paint is a better one

Thanks for the input guys. After a bit of consideration, I've decided to get a third sheet of plywood and mount it below the other two. Then I'll put the KSU at the top with the red backboard below it and the blue below the red like Bill suggested. I think that's the way to go. I'm going to keep an eye out for a half-width board (any color) that can go to the right of the red one. I'll paint it yellow if I have to.

This improved layout will allow me a lot of room on the right and bottom of the wall to route my station cables.

Ed, the main reason I mounted the Melco flat like I did was to make it easy for me to read the installation instructions. Plus I had a lot of space to fill in.

-Tim

PM sent.

The factory yellow boards came with the distribution rings, like the red, so if you paint your own you will need one set of your white boards. I think you'll find everything will flow better the way your going to do it. The only thing I'd add is if putting the KSU above makes your blue board too low than just put it to the left of the red and dress your cables in. You don't want to be on your knees working on stuff.

Edit: To correct side of red backboard to place KSU

I wish I had that much space when I put mine in! Do you have that many CO lines comming in, or will you be connecting just a few, or using an in-house PBX? When I move I expect to start from scratch and do a better job, but the current setup works just fine.

Bill,

I just measured the distance to the bottom of the blue board with my new layout and it's exactly 24" inches off the ground which appears to be a perfect height if I'm sitting the milk crate that I had planned to stand on in my original plan.

Rotary,

At the moment, I'm only using four of the line cards, connected to the Asterisk box. It just happened to come with 10 400E cards. Maybe one day I'll have some old step-by-step gear to hook up to the other line cards. I'll need a bigger closet though.

I would say that would be too low in a commercial application, but since it's for yourself whatever works best for you.

Looks like Asterisk is giving a whole new life to 1A2, I love it! There may come the time where residential 1A2 is more common than commercial! Also collectors should think of joining CNET where collectors can talk to other collectors via ENUM. You're using fxs ATA boxes to get your lines?

I'm using a Digium TDM400P with one Digium FXS module and three after market FXS modules. I was worried the after market ones (at about 1/3 the price) wouldn't be as good as the original, but I can't hear the difference.

What an incredible effort. I find that even taking the time alone to build 1a2 from scratch today should be admired in The HALL OF Fame....

Wait, That's a good one for a New Post Topic.. Hall Of Fame Vs. The Hall of Shame.

Have fun and learn from 1A2!

1A2 can be fun....

Good luck!

S.S. - thanks! It's hardly any effort at all though, when I can come here and get all my questions answered! :thumb:

Speaking of questions, I got a nice half size backboard from Ed yesterday (thanks Ed) and while it still needs to be painted yellow, I'm wondering about the best configuration of 66 blocks for the intercom. I think I should remove the brackets for the four 66M blocks and put two 66B blocks in in their place and then add six distribution posts below. That seems like the most logical way to do things.

BTW, the backboard the KSU is mounted on is 25-1/2" wide. I had thought that was a pretty strange size to make it, but of course it's 1.5 standard backboards wide which makes perfect sense when things are laid out like Bill and Ed suggested. Somebody really thought all of this out.

Tim:

I just placed a large order for backboards yesterday and included one yellow backboard (184A5) for your intercom block(s). I don't know if the manufacturer has one in stock, but if they do, I'll let you know when it gets here. It's not equipped with any blocks but drilled and tapped for 66B type blocks and I have plenty of those. It does come with six mushrooms installed.

Hold off on painting the backboard that I sent you for now!

Ed - No worries, I haven't even bought paint yet!

This evening I spent about four hours removing old cabling from the ceilings at work to get long enough 25- and 50-pair cables to finish my project. I think I succeeded and yet there's still enough up there to run a cable from work to my house. The remains of 25 years and three telephone systems worth of cabling, I don't think anyone ever removed an old cable. Heck, there's a whole power-pole up in the ceiling complete with outlets, just in case it might ever be needed again.

I'll post pictures in a bit of my KSU's original home.

How is the power pole IN the ceiling? LOL

Pictures as promised: Cabling Demo and KSU's old home.

Jeff, the power-pole is tywrap'ed horizontally to a roof truss about eight feet above the drop ceiling. This puts it at the level of the 8' fluorescent light fixtures (with lamps) above the ceiling that don't work.

Man, that's a lot of stuff

Man it looks great to me. I wish I had that much equipment to put up.... mine is a bit smaller in scope. Thinking about maybe moving my alarm panel over to where my 1A2 will be. Anyway, great job!

Wow, that's exactly how NOT to install equipment. That's surely a good training set of pictures. Everything that you see in them is what should NOT be done.

To be fair, the original installation, the 4 66B blocks to the left on the frame, are pretty good. It looks like the 3rd row of blocks, the 66M's that don't line up were added by someone else. There are no spools in that row and the original installer may have left the space for expansion and someone else came along and slapped a 66M block and tie cable into the space. It's the only set of blocks that are top fed. It also looks like the 66M blocks undderneath the B blocks don't belong as they are just stabbed in.

The 3 rows of M blocks on the right were probably from the original installation as they are also consistent with the two rows on the left.

I'm guessing it took several years and hands to get to this condition.

Carl

But it is a good example as to why the factory colored backboards were brought into use.

Oh stop it Bill! Some of us didn't have colored backboards in our practices. Come to think of it, we didn't have 584C panels either. I think 17A1 comes to mind......


Carl

Just wanted to add that in my last post, I was referring to the new job.... not the "cabling demo" post....

Look at the bright side - I bet after you get the other 90% ripped out, you can get a pretty good price for the scrap copper. Then again, I don't know if they give less for it being insulated.

And as far as the power pole in the ceiling, I think I figured that one out. Did a bit of googling, and found a pic of the original owners of the building:

https://img292.imageshack.us/img292/5315/ownersew6.jpg

Matt, you realize that if Eddie Albert were still alive, you'd be hit with a defamation of character law suit so fast, your head wouldn't have time to swim, it would be too busy drowning! John C. (Not Garand)

I agree with Bill; you simply cannot have a mess like that if using backboards. There's not a single member of this forum who cannot buy them. They are sold through all major suppliers, just like the blocks themselves.

Ed, first of all we are talking a different era. I was trained to lay out a frame properly on plywood or to use a commercial frame manufactured by Homaco. The 501 style Homaco frames are either 19 or 23 inches wide and are 66 block frames. Since I haven't used a B block in probably 15 years and 80% of my house cable is on 110 blocks, those colored backboards that I never used or never appeared in my "GSP's" don't apply.

Sure I can buy them. But why?

Carl

My question is this. For example on the install I did this summer, the whole wall was covered in plywood. Do you install those backboards on the plywood? That brings everything forward more and basically gives you two backboards...

Yes, Jeff, the backboards are (or at least can be) mounted upon existing plywood walls. These aren't intended to be a sole source for mounting blocks, but they can be used for that purpose if there's no existing plywood.

They are designed to provide a universal and uniformly-organized installation method. You can go to a site anywhere and immediately recognize that what's on the green backboard identifies incoming CO lines; blue indicates cables heading toward stations, and so on.

They also ensure that mushrooms are properly situated to prevent the likelihood that jumpers will wrap the post more than 180 degrees. This, instead of the "slapshot" method you usually see mushrooms placed where jumpers can't be pulled out without unwrapping them from the posts. There is MUCH more to the design of these backboard systems than just organization; it's also to demonstrate pride in quality, workmanship and labor savings.

Aw, that's not a problem. Mr. Haney will be glad to defend me!

So this evening I actually got around to hooking up some phones! And I've run in to a strange problem. I have four lines appearing at each set, all the same. What I don't have is a steady light to indicate that a line is in use. I have incoming call blinking and on-hold winking, but no steady in use light. This is true for all the sets and all the lines. That leads me to believe that I missed a power connection to the KSU or perhaps a blown fuse, but initial investigation didn't find it. Anyone run in to this before? Thoughts?

Problem solved. I'm not going to say what it was just yet. There seems to be a fine tradition of quiz giving on this board and I wouldn't want to miss out on tradition.

Easy fix: I believe that you said you're using a 584C panel.

Check fuses 7,8,9, and 10

There are many fuses on the back of the panel. Lamp steady, lamp flash, and lamp wink are provided, via the interrupter, through fuses that are further split up into 4 groups of 3 or 4 line cards at a time.

If the blown fuse(s) are not immediately evident from a visual inspection (sometimes the fuse wire breaks right at the point where it is welded to the body of the fuse), you need to test for an open fuse.

In rare cases it might be a bad interrupter. I just called my old partner to verify that between us, in a combined 70 years of service, we changed maybe three interrupters each during our careers.

It was of course fuse #10 which provides steady lamp to cards 1, 2 and 3 in program A mode according to the ITT documentation, but since I am using a Stromberg Carlson model which is slightly different, I believe #10 feeds cards 1, 2, 3 and 4.

Added a BLF to the mix today and realized that I either need a lot more 1A1 KTUs like the 227B that I can use the relays from, or a good supply of 24V bulbs.

Tim:

Didn't you get my e-mail about the 185A1 yellow backboard arriving for your intercom circuits? Are you still interested? If so, I have one for you, brand-new. Let me know.

I also have the 24V bulbs in stock for the BLF.

Ed -

PM sent.

-Tim

Ed supply,Inc! Absolutely astounding what you have in that warehouse! I asked in the 'installer' forum, but I'll ask anyway. TIE 2040/3060 power supply? Need it for non-phone app. See post in "installer' if you are really curious! John C. (Not Garand)

John:

Yes, I do have some of those big blue bad boys. If you're serious, I'll check and see which ones they are.

Ed, if Tim doesn't want the yellow board, Matt might.

Hopefully it's on its way to me but now that you mention it Ken, I'll bet Matt will want one if he doesn't have one already.

I think I might also need a green board now, or maybe a purple, I'm not sure. I've got an Adtran TA 850 on its way to light up some more lines and (if I read the docs correctly) allow me to dial with the rotary phones. This was something that I wasn't able to do with the Digium TDM400P since apparently the guys that designed it decided that pulse dialing was dead. I don't fault them for this since pulse dialing was on its way out before they (or myself) were born, but somebody ought to think of the people who prefer phones with moving parts!

Anyway, since the TA 850 connects to the Asterisk box in place of the TDM400 and the purpose of the Asterisk box is to connect me to cnet so I can (hopefully) call things like Arthur's 701* and other (I don't want to use the word antique) less modern switchgear do the lines coming out of it represent CO lines (green board) or are they just PBX lines (purple board)?

*What news? Did it arrive safely from the left coast?

Green is for CO lines and you shouldn't need a purple it was for PBX. The green would just make it more "correct" if that's what you're going for. With just a few CO lines you could spray a 66 block and bracket green, just protect the pins. If you want to get real fancy you could pop the back off a block and dump the pins out, paint it and put it back together.

Got the yellow board and a bunch of 52A lamps from Ed last night, but didn't get them installed until this evening. Thanks Ed!! A gentleman and a scholar.

Post some pics when you get the rest installed!

Hi guys

I am new to this BB. I took one of these out of a site not to long ago. If i had known that someone was interested in this stuff I would have let him have it for the cost of shipping. For me it was to big and to heavy to use as a boat anchor, and besides it did not have a good place to tie a rope to it.

Good luck in keeping it running.

Hey Tim, did you get this all installed and finished? Looking forward to any pics you might have.

Jeff,

It's pretty much done, I just haven't gotten the motivation to pull the rest of the station cables. And I'm supposed to be moving into a real house soon so I'm not even sure that I should finish this before I move. After all, it wouldn't be operational for more than about a month before I'd have undo everything and pack it up.

It seems likely that I'll have a new (to me) house before I have 1A2 in every room. I'm optimistic that having a place to myself will make this a lot easier since I'll be able to work at hours more to my liking. Apparently, when you live in a townhouse the neighbors get cranky when you hammer-drill into concrete block at 2:00am.

Also, I did a dumb thing. I got a hold of some step-by-step switching equipment that has, since it moved in, conspired to take over my basement. (As an aside, I rent a house with some roommates and I live in the basement, see above). I'm now awash in 8" tall gray cans.

So in all likelihood, the next pictures you see will have been taken in a different room altogether. Hopefully a bigger room, far away from the water heater and furnace.

Tim, what kind of step equipment do you have? Is it ready to operate, or in "kit" form?

You might want to see what some of us are doing with our old electro-mechanical stuff.

www.ckts.info

You know Arthur, and please don't take this the wrong way, but I find it a bit humorous how equipment that was so "antiquated" is now so hot.

CKTS.info is doing a great job of merging the old with the new to prove a point that they can coexist. Aside from a hobbyist's perspective, it's a shame that there won't be more interest in the concept. Unfortunately, corporate executives are only interested in buying from equally-sized corporations. I wish that you guys who are working on resurrecting this hardware had more influence over corporate America.

Tim: Just stash the slack on your cables in a joist bay or hide it somewhere out of site. That way, you can pull them back out when you move and use them at the new place.

I certainly wouldn't take it the "wrong" way. I worked on that stuff for 20 years, keeping it humming. I installed switch frames, only to be in charge of their removal, 10 years later. I never suspected that anyone, myself included, would ever have any interest in that crapola.

It would be like a coal miner taking his pick and shovel home with him and doing a little digging on his days off.

Now, however, like most old technology, and the fools who worked on it, there is a rebirth of interest, and I seem to have caught the disease. I'm having a great time.

Arthur, I only have half of the step equation. I have four line finders, four sets of line relays and a set of group relays and a distributer and some support equipment. I still need selectors to be able to actually dial anything. It's somewhere in between kit form and ready to go.

I guess I got interested in the older telephone stuff because it's what my grandfather used to do. He was an installer for Western Electric for 40 odd years where he worked primarily with the mechanical switching equipment.

I'm going to visit my grandmother this weekend and see if my grandfather kept any electrical drawings for the SxS equipment and hopefully pick up an electric wire wrapping gun. Eventually I want to get this whole contraption (SxS with 1A2 behind it) connected to CNET.

Ed: I've kept all the slack from the cables on top of a heating duct that runs through my telephone room. Although they were free, I put too much effort into getting them out of the ceiling at work to not be able to reuse them!

Tim, I can email you a diagram that was used as a training aid in NYTelCO Plant Training School. It shows a 701A PBX, diagramming one call through the switch train. One LF, one SEL, and one CONN, along with the L&CO and group relays and ringing plant. You will, in turn, need to email it to a commercial printer who has the capability of printing on a 2 foot by 3 foot piece of paper.

Arthur, I'd appreciate that. I can print it at work, we've got a 36" plotter.

To add to this conversation, the selector is used if you have 3 digit or greater dialing. You can have 3 digit dialing with only finders and connectors. The first digit is used to step/control a minor switch located in the connector. This was used primarily to control party ringing. Now that I have headache I wish you luck in this newest endeavor.

Tim, email w/attachment sent. APB