Old car radiotelephone

[Firebottle]

A blast from the past here, I had one decades ago in an old Datsun Cherry estate.
I have just been given this, it is a Pye Cambridge with production life 1961 - 1970.

Originally AM with an output of 5-7W this one has been converted to amateur radio use on FM.
It is not small, there is a boot mount chassis with remote control head and speaker and microphone. Very Z cars era.

These were used as early radio telephones with a maximum of six channel, call signs and one way speech (..over).
This is the boot mount chassis:

http://i65.tinypic.com/9uxk6o.jpg

The control box and speaker, you can tell it's a radiotelephone 'cause it says so:

http://i68.tinypic.com/2myosxx.jpg

The microphone really looks ancient, plus being as large as a modern smartphone:

http://i67.tinypic.com/2qbzkll.jpg

The transmitter section uses valves (ooooohh):

http://i67.tinypic.com/dq5enn.jpg

It still works on transmit but not on receive. In reality it is a museum piece, here is an original photo from Pye:

http://www.pyetelecomhistory.org/prodhist/mobiles/am10/fm10b-0003-crop-800p.jpg

:)

[walpurgis]

I used something very similar at work in the seventies. (I was 'Tango Three' by the way :D)

[struth]

Had something similar but more modern with one of the companies i worked for. late 70's into 80's... worked quite well but had range limits

[Macca]

I've still got one of these, boxed, perfect condition. People asking eighty squid for them on ebay:

https://i.imgur.com/ZiITMZj.jpg