My 1980's model Southwestern Bell Freedom Phone desktop phone was made
before quality and durability were completely forgotten by designers.
It has a nice accessible hookswitch with contacts visible for
inspection, and a really nice touchtone keypad that feels solid and
looks like it will last a long time.

This phone has three wires connected to the input cable, red green and
black, while all my other phones have only two wires connected to the
input cable.

I haven't used this phone in a few years and it seems to be totally
dead. There is no dial tone or static or line noise, no dialing will
work, no tones, nothing.

So far I've checked the input resistance with the hookswitch open and
closed and it gets a finite but very large resistance (8.5 Meg-OHM, I
think) with the phone off hook, between the red and green wires, and
something similar with the other pairs.
The black wire is actually connected to the hookswitch contacts and
also to a metal plate on the dialing keypad.

The piece you hold in your hand (handset?) will work when connected to
another phone.

What should I do next to diagnose the problem? I have perused this
group's topics, but I'm afraid I have little experience with phone
repair beyond cleaning the contacts on the hookswitch.

Thanks, Guy

On 2 Mar 2007 19:38:08 -0800, "badgerboy"
wrote:

My 1980's model Southwestern Bell Freedom Phone desktop phone was made
before quality and durability were completely forgotten by designers.
It has a nice accessible hookswitch with contacts visible for
inspection, and a really nice touchtone keypad that feels solid and
looks like it will last a long time.

This phone has three wires connected to the input cable, red green and
black, while all my other phones have only two wires connected to the
input cable.

I haven't used this phone in a few years and it seems to be totally
dead. There is no dial tone or static or line noise, no dialing will
work, no tones, nothing.

So far I've checked the input resistance with the hookswitch open and
closed and it gets a finite but very large resistance (8.5 Meg-OHM, I
think) with the phone off hook, between the red and green wires, and

I'm 99% sure that is way too high. What is the resistance of the
handset. The handset uses all 4 wires, 2 for the microphone and 2 for
the speaker. I don't remember which are which, but the two for the
mike should be electrically separate from the two for the speaker when
the handset is not plugged in.

something similar with the other pairs.
The black wire is actually connected to the hookswitch contacts and
also to a metal plate on the dialing keypad.

The piece you hold in your hand (handset?) will work when connected to
another phone.

So it must be good. so is the 8megohms something in the handset or
something that gets inserted by the phone? After you measure you'll
know. If the resistance is in the phone, my first guess would be that
it's because one of the switches aren't closing right when you take
the handset off the hook. You can take a piece of wire and short
out the switches that should be closed and see if there is a switch
that isn't making contact like it should. A wire with an alligator
clip on at least one end is good for something like this.

What should I do next to diagnose the problem? I have perused this
group's topics, but I'm afraid I have little experience with phone
repair beyond cleaning the contacts on the hookswitch.

I'd bypass them before cleaning them, because it's probably easier and
you can get a clear yes/no where you go back and forth. Once you
clean them you can't make them dirty again so you might reassemble
everything only to find out it was an intermittent problem that is
back again. OTOH, in this case, I gather it is not intermittent. So
it probablydoesn't matter.

Thanks, Guy

badgerboy wrote:

My 1980's model Southwestern Bell Freedom Phone desktop phone was made
before quality and durability were completely forgotten by designers.
It has a nice accessible hookswitch with contacts visible for
inspection, and a really nice touchtone keypad that feels solid and
looks like it will last a long time.

This phone has three wires connected to the input cable, red green and
black, while all my other phones have only two wires connected to the
input cable.

I haven't used this phone in a few years and it seems to be totally
dead. There is no dial tone or static or line noise, no dialing will
work, no tones, nothing.

So far I've checked the input resistance with the hookswitch open and
closed and it gets a finite but very large resistance (8.5 Meg-OHM, I
think) with the phone off hook, between the red and green wires, and
something similar with the other pairs.
The black wire is actually connected to the hookswitch contacts and
also to a metal plate on the dialing keypad.

The piece you hold in your hand (handset?) will work when connected to
another phone.

What should I do next to diagnose the problem? I have perused this
group's topics, but I'm afraid I have little experience with phone
repair beyond cleaning the contacts on the hookswitch.

Thanks, Guy



Some of the earlier touch tone phones were polarity sensitive.

Just for ****s and grins try reversing the green and red leads. It can't
do any damage and it might just solve the problem.

I'm puzzled by the extremely high resistance too, but there just might
be a series diode in that phone used to avoid damaging it on reversed
polarity and since you didn't mention measuring the resistance "in both
directions" with whatever meter you used, that could be it.

Jeff

--
Jeffry Wisnia
(W1BSV + Brass Rat '57 EE)
The speed of light is 1.98*10^14 fathoms per fortnight.