"Sal M. Onella" wrote in message
...

I had an El Cheapo phone on my nightstand for years. It was a one-piece
unit that I laid face-down to hang up. It always gave out a chirp right
before the ring, which I imagine was related to the ghost ring your friend
heard.

In addition, that phone emitted an offbeat three chirp pattern every
evening
about 10:45. If my wife and I were there together, one of us would
usually
wisecrack about the FBI and phone taps. I imagine it had something to do
with testing the line. I had forgetten all about that.



I recall during my teen years in Fort Worth, TX (Southwestern Bell) in the
mid-80s, during the summer months I would stay up for most of the night. I
had one of those el-cheapo electronic handheld phones in my room and it
always emitted a quick chirp at the same time each night: 2:10 a.m., without
fail! My guess is that it was responding to some high-voltage blip sent
down the network by the phone company for maintenance tasks or something.
Cecil Adams covered this topic in his column "The Straight Dope."

On Apr 29, 7:22 am, "Matt J. McCullar" wrote:
"Sal M. Onella" wrote in ...



I had an El Cheapo phone on my nightstand for years. It was a one-piece
unit that I laid face-down to hang up. It always gave out a chirp right
before the ring, which I imagine was related to the ghost ring your friend
heard.

In addition, that phone emitted an offbeat three chirp pattern every
evening
about 10:45. If my wife and I were there together, one of us would
usually
wisecrack about the FBI and phone taps. I imagine it had something to do
with testing the line. I had forgotten all about that.

I recall during my teen years in Fort Worth, TX (Southwestern Bell) in the
mid-80s, during the summer months I would stay up for most of the night. I
had one of those el-cheapo electronic handheld phones in my room and it
always emitted a quick chirp at the same time each night: 2:10 a.m., without
fail! My guess is that it was responding to some high-voltage blip sent
down the network by the phone company for maintenance tasks or something.
Cecil Adams covered this topic in his column "The Straight Dope."

Re telephones (old time dial type).
When your phone was 'on the hook' (no calls in progress) there was
typically a steady negative 48 volts on one side of the line pair and
zero volts on the other side of the line from either a balanced or
unbalanced 'line' relay. When you picked up the phone to make a call
the relay/s would spring into action and connect you dial tone etc.
When someone called YOU the line relay/s were disconnected and another
circuit set up by the person who dialled your number, prepared to
supply AC ringing to your line to ring the phone. However that supply
also had a DC component so that when you answered DC current would
flow, cut off the ringing and energise the microphone in your phone.
many different step-by-step systems, panel systems and crossbar but
the basic 'line' conditions were somewhat as described. In North
America the ringing was/is typically a 2 second burst fol owed by a 4
second break, at frequency of around 20 hertz. In other countries it
was often a sort of double burst of ringing followed by 4 second
break. So each 'cycle' of rings takes about 6 seconds. Something
remember if you are sitting on the can etc. when it rings!
So if the ringer bell or the ring-chirper was sensitive to small
changes in voltage (aka cheap or maladjusted phone) there was
definitely a possibility of a slight change of voltage on the line as
the dial office equipment set up and prepared to ring your phone.
Some of those el-cheapo phones were horrible; in one case they damped
down a fireman's line so badly that he didn't get emergency calls. The
cause was two cheap phones supplied with magazine subscriptions to his
two sons, who unwittingly hooked them up and stopped his main phone
from ringing. Cost our telephone company several hours/days of effort
to find out why an essential fireman's phone didn't work when every
other phone around his area was OK. But we did so cos his service was
important. Not so sure these days of competition anyone would bother;
it might be a case of 'Service OK leaving here. YOU have a problem'!
Oh; another radio related el-cheapo phone item! When we built our
first house the only service available in the area was one party on a
four party line! One of the other parties had a cheap phone on an
unsteady cheap metal stand and its handset kept falling off. One
Sunday trying to make a call and very frustrated I eventually played a
religious broadcast (of another denomination than theirs) as loud as
possible down the telephone line. Listening occasionally between burst
of loud hymn music one could hear "Where's that music coming
from ................. " comments and, ultimately the phone put back
on hook. Finally I could make my work related call!
Make sure you have fun out there!

On Apr 29, 7:22 am, "Matt J. McCullar" wrote:
"Sal M. Onella" wrote in ...



I had an El Cheapo phone on my nightstand for years. It was a one-piece
unit that I laid face-down to hang up. It always gave out a chirp right
before the ring, which I imagine was related to the ghost ring your friend
heard.

In addition, that phone emitted an offbeat three chirp pattern every
evening
about 10:45. If my wife and I were there together, one of us would
usually
wisecrack about the FBI and phone taps. I imagine it had something to do
with testing the line. I had forgetten all about that.

I recall during my teen years in Fort Worth, TX (Southwestern Bell) in the
mid-80s, during the summer months I would stay up for most of the night. I
had one of those el-cheapo electronic handheld phones in my room and it
always emitted a quick chirp at the same time each night: 2:10 a.m., without
fail! My guess is that it was responding to some high-voltage blip sent
down the network by the phone company for maintenance tasks or something.
Cecil Adams covered this topic in his column "The Straight Dope."

And oh yes; some telephone systems had 'Routiners' or 'Line Insulation
Testers' that would typically test through all the lines often late at
night when there are/were few calls and identify any leakage due to
wet cables and other non-normal conditions etc. two such incidents
were when a member of a telephone company vice president's family left
a phone outside in the rain and another when someone washed their
telephone set in the kitchen sink and put it aside to dry, without
unplugging it!
Keep looking for the ironic and the humorous.