The begining
Ian came round after work today, to help me unload this from my car (where it’s been since Sunday morning when I bought it) as I can’t lift it on my own!
It’s an ATE 10-2 PAX, which is a 10 line electromechanical phone exchange (lots of buzzing, clicking and whirring bits in there!) – designed for small business/factory use, it was built by the Automatic Telephone & Electric Co Ltd, of Liverpool.
It’s missing its power unit, and only one of the line fuses is intact, but otherwise it appears to be complete.
My plan is as follows:
- Get hold of some diagrams for it
- Build a new PSU for it (probably based around some lead acid batteries and a charger)
- Get it working
- Strip the case down, and have it shot blasted and repainted
- Possibly build a new front door for it out of perspex, so you can watch it do its thing as you dial
- Build a plinth for it with casters so I can move it about more easily
- I’m also hoping to build an appropriate relay set to get it talking to CNET
First things first though, it’s been sat in a garrage for years and is filthy, so my first job is to give it a clean!
Great project! I’d be tempted to make it play music with the relays, or have it move around on its own like some kind of electromechanical R2D2….