Ken's Payphone Thread

Hi Cueball,
I read your entry (posted in 2011) about your AT&T Private payphone and setting the rates and distance. I just bought one of these, and need to program it. Mine asks for $1 for all calls, long distance or local. I was especially interested in the fact that you found someone who could re-program it with a DOS program. I have tried to find the CoinSoft software everywhere, but no luck. Could you give me the name or the phone number of the telephone guy who contacted you and was able to re-program your phone? It would be a really great help! The strangest thing is that when I powered up the phone (it was new in the box for 22 years) the date and time came up nearly correct! It is only off by 16 hours, the difference between the time here in Maryland, and in Taiwan where it was made. Again, no way to re-program it without some help.

Thanks a million,
Payphone

It looks like the Payphone411 website may be getting some A.T. & T. Private Payphone manuals soon:

http://www.payphone411.com/manuals.html
 
Okay, I picked up the payphone. It came with a manual that was left in a plastic bag in the rain. I can still flip through most of it. It is an "AT&T Private Payphone Plus". The pics of the inside look different than the others that were listed and/or linked. I didn't realize how heavy they were. I definitely need a pedestal, as I dont know if it want to throw that weight on my wall.

All in all not bad. Had to get up early and travel a bit but with the keys, manual, phone and mounting plate, it only cost me $25.

If you still have this extremely rare manual, please scan it and submit it to the Payphone411 website manuals section.

http://www.payphone411.com/home.html
 
If you still have this extremely rare manual, please scan it and submit it to the Payphone411 website manuals section.

http://www.payphone411.com/home.html

I will have to check. I have been in touch with Rob, trying to get my Elcotels programmed. I had bought some new in box that had all manuals and the programming software. I know I scanned all of my elcotel docs (which are present on his site). I am not sure if I mailed him the att book or not. If I do have it, I will scan it for him.

I've just been crazy busy with life and kids activities. It all starts slowing down in October
 
For those with an A.T. & T. Private Payphone regular or the Plus model, I found a picture of the original power transformer and marked it up with the pinout.

The "C.T." means Center Tap as this transformer has center tapped secondary winding.
 

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This is a great thread Ken! In fact, it finally pushed me over the edge to donate so I could post.

I recently acquired a very nice payphone locally, and I have it mounted and working in my apartment. It's connected to a cheapo GrandStream voip adapter and the phone is talking to one of my asterisk servers. It works pretty well as a novelty! I believe it is complete on the inside, it has the ringer and coin system, just no coin box. It came with a generic Bell South vault door cover, and I switched it out with a really nifty NOS Olympic Bell South cover.

I love that the phone generates the correct tones when I put coins through it, is there a way to integrate that with a voip system? That would be fun.

One thing that I know is likely impossible, but that I would love to accomplish, is acquiring the original phone number assigned to and printed all over the info cards in the phone. It's relatively easy to port a number you used to own, but does anyone know how to go about acquiring a number like that which used to be assigned to a pay phone? At least I can spoof the outgoing caller ID :p
 

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Regulated telephone companies always have set aside blocks of phone numbers to be issued only to payphones. If that particular phone number is no currently in use, then it might be possible to get it reassigned to yours. Contact your local regulated telephone company business office to find out if they can do it.
 
I think getting the old number might be next to impossible! After some research I found out the numbering is handled by NANPA, the North American Numbering Plan Administration.

I sent them a quick email asking basic questions about number porting and how I could possibly go about obtaining the number, and I got a pretty hilarious passive-aggressive reply! I guess they take their jobs pretty seriously.

Some excerpts:

First of all, Numbering Resources are not "owned", they are a public resource and as such cannot be traded, sold, or otherwise bartered.
FCC also prohibits the securing of numbering resources (except 800-type) for "vanity" reasons.

So many snarky quotation marks :D

The dream is dead! But the pay phone is alive and working great.
 
I will have to check. I have been in touch with Rob, trying to get my Elcotels programmed. I had bought some new in box that had all manuals and the programming software. I know I scanned all of my elcotel docs (which are present on his site). I am not sure if I mailed him the att book or not. If I do have it, I will scan it for him.

I've just been crazy busy with life and kids activities. It all starts slowing down in October

Any chance I could get a copy of the AT&T payphone manual?

By the way, years ago when we had some AT&T Private Payphones on the route, I ended up hand drawing a schematic of the power supply board due to the fact AT&T would not provide any schematics or service information (I know, I asked them kindly). Unfortunately, about 15 years or so ago, I threw away all the AT&T payphone manuals and the schematic.
 
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I found the book. It's and owners manual. I actually have two. One was water damaged. So I found another on ebay(I think it's a copy). I will try to get it scanned at work over the next week or so. I will be happy to share it.
 
Good to know Ken. I am going to reach out to the guy who updated my phone 3 years ago and see of he is interested in helping the community. If I have to, I will pay a nominal fee for a copy.

But my guess is that he won't do it as he is still has payphones in route and is probably suspicious and would think I and trying to compete. Lol.
 
Coming soon to the payphone411.com website:

AT&T Private Payphone Owner's Manual (original model without remote programming) # 845-775-980

AT&T Private Payphone Plus Owner's Manual (later model with remote programming of rates) # 846-003-341
 
For what it's worth - I believe you are confusing trademark rights with software copyright... The fact that they didn't renew the trademark indicates they may not care about the intellectual property associated with it - but it doesn't make the software public domain.


I did some googling around about the AT&T "CoinSoft" software. Found out the trademark was cancelled back on January 29, 1996. So apparently AT&T no longer cares about the software. I guess anyone can copy it now, if anyone can locate a copy, that is.

http://trademarks.justia.com/737/64/coinsoft-73764100.html
 
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