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Date:         Sat, 19 Dec 2009 09:38:42 -0600
Reply-To:     Tom Hargrave <thargrav@HIWAAY.NET>
Sender:       Vanagon Mailing List <vanagon@gerry.vanagon.com>
From:         Tom Hargrave <thargrav@HIWAAY.NET>
Subject:      Re: Rubber...Our best friend...Our worst enemy
Comments: To: george jannini <georgejoann@GMAIL.COM>
In-Reply-To:  <229ab7ae0912190713r2aaca1f1he6a30bf93703c9e@mail.gmail.com>
Content-Type: text/plain; charset="us-ascii"

To get more technical, the plastics used to manufacture the old land line phones would not survive 1 week in the engine compartment of a typical car.

I worked for GTE for years and all of our telephone housings were made of ABS plastic. ABS is only good to about 140 degrees F

Thanks, Tom Hargrave 256-656-1924

Our Web Sites: www.kegkits.com www.stir-plate.com www.andyshotsauce.com

-----Original Message----- From: Vanagon Mailing List [mailto:vanagon@GERRY.VANAGON.COM] On Behalf Of george jannini Sent: Saturday, December 19, 2009 9:14 AM To: vanagon@GERRY.VANAGON.COM Subject: Re: Rubber...Our best friend...Our worst enemy

Scott said<

>>... if anyone remembers old land line dial phones.....ever notice how indestructible that plastic was ? You could slam one of those to the floor as hard as you want , or use the handset to hammer in nails ...................they used completely indestructible ( or nearly ) plastic on those old phones. <<

You've got a bit of an apples and oranges comparison going on there, Scott.

I expect that the main reason phones were so well built was that the local phone companies owned the sets and leased them to their customers.

Maintenance was taken care of by the company, and servicing the equipment was the job of the company and provided without extra charge, so the service provider had a stake in keeping costs down.

I might also add that the phone companies designed and built nearly all of their own equipment. Western Electric was a wholly owned subsidiary of AT&T, and other manufacturers of built to WECO standards- wasn't military spec, but damn close! <G>

I worked with old fashioned dial equipment that had been in place nearly 50 years before being replaced in 1978 with switch that was already obsolete. It's was with a digital switch after maybe 30 years online, tops.

Not many automobile companies out there that offer a product that has a 20+ year design life.

George Bellhead/ATL, ex- phonie


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