Telephone keypad not dialing
G. Jefferson
> When I press any key, I get the same dead sound, nothing goes out it seems.
> Pressing the keys does not alter the dial tone.
If you find a simple sol'n let me know. I have a collection of no-dial
phones...
Donna A. Lilly
When I press any key, I get the same dead sound, nothing goes out it seems.
Pressing the keys does not alter the dial tone.
I am competent with a multimeter, but I thought it would be simple so I
looked at the internal wiring and it doesn't look obvious anymore. Also,
the first thing is I checked the connector where the phone plugs into the
line, the old red, green, yeller, and it seems like the connections are
o.k. (but I know it seems like that would be it doesn't it?).
Anyway, I thought maybe someone more familiar with this problem could give
me advice on it.
Thank you for any help!
--
Donna Lilly
Cleveland, OH
frsni00!taleona@frsni08
this may be a dump sounding replay but most old touchtones
are polarity sin./ rev. the tip and ring and try again @
(red and green in most phone wireing) have goten alot of
good phones this way because some one said they where bad?
Floyd Davidson
>> I have a touchtone phone on which the keypad is not sending anything out.
>> When I press any key, I get the same dead sound, nothing goes out it seems.
>> Pressing the keys does not alter the dial tone.
>
>
>If you find a simple sol'n let me know. I have a collection of no-dial
>phones...
It might be worth a try to reverse the tip and ring connections from the
telephone line. On some older models it made a difference because the
polarity had to be right to supply voltage to the touchtone pad. On
most models there is a ring bridge and it works no matter which way
the line is connected.
Floyd
--
fl...@ims.alaska.edu A guest on the Institute of Marine Science computer
Salcha, Alaska system at the University of Alaska at Fairbanks.
John A. Cassaboom
Donna A. Lilly <bx...@po.cwru.edu> wrote:
>I have a touchtone phone on which the keypad is not sending anything out.
>When I press any key, I get the same dead sound, nothing goes out it seems.
>
[Stuff deleted]
Some older phones are sensitive to the polarity of the open circuit voltage
appearing across the wires (red-green). Have you tried reversing the
leads? I have an old western electric touchtone telephone which won't
"break the dialtone" unless the polarity is right. I didn't know
it made a difference, until a Phone installer buddy said to try
swapping the leads. Worked for me.
John Cassaboom
Donna A. Lilly
In a previous article, bx...@cleveland.Freenet.Edu (Donna A. Lilly) says:
>I have a touchtone phone on which the keypad is not sending anything out.
>When I press any key, I get the same dead sound, nothing goes out it seems.
>Pressing the keys does not alter the dial tone.
I didn't quite figure out the exact cause of the problem, but it the reason
my 'old style' touchtone phone was unable to dial was attenuation on the
line. It seems when the signal strength (+V between green and red I
think?) gets below a certain point, that phones fail in rather
idiosyncratic ways, like being unable to 'hang up' or unable to 'dial'. So
it wasn't the phone, not the outside line, but something causing the
voltage to drop inside the house. I thought of just rewiring a jack
straight from the outside box to maximize the signal strength but haven't
gotten around to it yet.
An interesting side note. To get the touchtone phone to work, I had to
remove the two way splitter that goes to my modem, and the other wire goes
to the telephone. Seems that with an already low signal that the splitter
dropped the signal strength just below the point where the telephone would
operate correctly. I tried a new splitter, but the same thing happens, so
its just the amount of signal loss inherent to the splitter no longer
leaves me with an adequate phone signal.
Donna A. Lilly
everything is plugged in but the modems power switch is off, the touchtone
phone works fine. But when the modem's power switch is on, the line has
problems and the phone doesn't work in several ways. Now, the problem
is manifested by not being able to hang up the line, the line won't carry a
dialtone unless the modem power switch is toggled. After toggling the
power, I can either make one call or connect with the modem, but am left
with a dead (no dial tone) line afterwards.
The modem is a ZOOM, and has a 7 year warranty, so I'll find out how good
that is. Incidently, I always disconnect it when there is lightning, so I
don't see why it crapped out after less than 1 1/2 years of use. My guess
is I may have been working, left the modem plugged in, and there was stormy
weather of which I was unaware.
David Juggie Hunter
>An interesting side note. To get the touchtone phone to work, I had to
>remove the two way splitter that goes to my modem, and the other wire goes
>to the telephone. Seems that with an already low signal that the splitter
>dropped the signal strength just below the point where the telephone would
>operate correctly. I tried a new splitter, but the same thing happens, so
>its just the amount of signal loss inherent to the splitter no longer
>leaves me with an adequate phone signal.
There's a Ringer Equivalence Number on the bottom of most phone equipment or
on some label on the product. It's around .4 or .5 for a regular phone.
I believe most residential wiring for telephones is around 30V (hmm...I could
be wrong, but I've gotten nasty shocks before :-) Fumble fingers) and about 5-
7 devices can be hooked up without anything going kooky. Anything beyond that
you start getting things like half-rings, sudden disconnects, low volume on
the phone, etc. Especially on the "new fangled" phones that use a lot of
accessory power.
If the problem isn't too many devices, there may be some problem with the
wiring or the wire going the MPE. Have the phone company check it out.
I don't know about other states, but in California, the phone co (PacBell)
is responsible for all outside wiring up to the MPE. Heck, they may even
be able to "juice it" up a little by fiddling around with local junc. box.
Uh, just a note...all that's said here is based on rumor, conjecture, and so-
called common sense. Believe at own risk. :-)