Does anyone know where I can find hardware and instructions for a voice tube system? I want to install voice tubes between the floors of my 3 story house, and I know these exist because I saw a system with simple, attractive boxes in a brand new house a couple of years ago. This seems to be the most obscure piece of hardware out there. Extensive web searching has found me nothing.
From building boxes and fitting face frames to installing doors and drawers, these techniques could be used for lots of cabinet projects.
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I suspect you would get more hits if you focus your searches to ships, where voice tubes have a long history and are still used in some older vessels. Simply put voice tubes are a rugged and well understood technology that requires no power.
Last ones I saw were brass or bronze used on a WW1 battleship. Looked like brass drain piping soldered together with brass bells and plugs at the terminal ends. I suppose if I wanted to recreate a system I would use 2" copper drain plumbing pipes, sweeps for bends and have a shop machine, spin, the bell ends for me to create the proper bugle ends.
The plugs would be cork or hardwood. Leather seals held in place with brass headed tacks would be a nice touch. Brass beaded chain to complete the look and keep the plugs handy. Fix the array of three or so bugle ends to different locations in a nice piece of mahogany with lots of brass strapping and nail heads. Add some small engraved placards to tell the user which tubes connect to what rooms.
Some plugs would include a whistle so the person on the other end would blow. Never understood how that worked given a tube size of 2" and perhaps 40' of run but that's how I remember it. Maybe they had stronger lungs back then. Others had a small bell that would be rung if a marble was dropped into the cone at the other end.
From what I got from the movies I've seen, the whistle is at the receiving end. The person who wants to talk just blows and the air rushes out the stopper with the whistle at the other end, then that person, hearing the whistle, uncorks his end (removes the whistle) and speaks.
I'm merely inquisitive. In an era of wireless technology, why? Is this something in keeping with the internal design or decoration of your house? Or did you used to work on an old merchantman where they were a daily part of life?
It seems the old intercom system, now gone wireless, would be a whole lot easier to obtain and install, cover more area of the house, and be easier to upgrade with options for internal smoke and CO monitors/alarms, clocks, timers, reminders, radios, etc.
By the time you've finished fabricating the parts, probably a might less expensive too. Of course, if the electricity goes out, your tube system does keep on going.
All the Democrats he prosecuted were conservative democrats with the exception of Jim Mattox.
It's funny how the spin started that the indictment was political and had no basis in fact. Just a Democrat with a history of harrassing Republicans. Oh, wait....maybe not. Just a Democrat with a history of harrassing Conservative Democrats. That's towing the ol' party line, obviously.
It's amazing that with all the money and dirty tricks that has been thrown at the Repubs by the likes of George Soros, Michael Moore, Dan Rather and their ilk. The best thing the Dems had going for them was a decent little DA down in Travis (where the heck is that) County Texas.
Only Democrats use 'dirty tricks'? Doesn't that term even derive from Republican actions spanning the last two decades?
George Soros gives money to support what he believes is right. Surely there are some Republican donors doing the same thing. I'm looking at you, Rupert Murdock.
I'll give you Michael Moore is a little over the top for most; but he works hard for his cause, which is something more Americans should do. And no matter how Fox "News" tries to spin it, he tells the truth, albeit in a way that is easily descreditted in a childish "I know you are, but what am I" tone the right likes to use.
Dan Rather? Give me a break. The funny thing about the "Liberal Media" is that it's NOT LIBERAL. What was Rather's folly? Ratings. Journalism today isn't about telling the news, it's about beating the other guy to the story in case it is true. And remember, the secretary who would have typed the memo said she didn't remember typing it, but it sounds like something that would have been said about Mr. Bush. It wasn't true, but plausible. With a news cycle of just a few hours, that's all news orgs rely on.
Solution? No network news; everyone watch PBS or listen to All Things Considered. Get huge corporations out of the news business. At least make the news longer than 1/2 hour. You can't convey the complexities in three minutes. Around here we have 1 1/2 hours of local news. Plus, it's horrible news. If it bleeds, it leads.
Just doing my part,
Raymond
ROH Construction
Raymond,
How in the hell did you manage to get this post located in this thread?
You must be a magician.Remodeling Contractor just outside the Glass City.
Quittin' Time
>>Raymond,>>How in the hell did you manage to get this post located in this thread?>>You must be a magician.ROFLMAO!
Huh?
This post is about talking tubes installed in a 3 story house.
What's political rantings got to do with it?Griff
Try "Old House Journal"
They are in all the new playground structures around here, maybe ask a manufacturer of play structures?
Mike
Trust in God, but row away from the rocks.
Any tubing of the right size will do. You could use PVC pipe or electrical conduit. Conduit has the advantage of long radius sweeps.
That doesn't help you on an attractive cover, though.
try and find some old cornets or trumpets and use the bell end off of them for your system.
My guess is that copper (or, even better, brass) would be better than plastic, since the plastic is more apt to damp out the sound. (Of course, plastic would be a lot cheaper.)Probably the tubing needs to be held in place with isolating clamps to keep random noises in the house from overwhelming the "signal".BTW, anyone remember the old Red Green episode where he devised a comode intercom system?
Telephone based intercoms (intercom is built into the phone and uses the same 2 wires) are so inexspensive, why would you use anything else? Just wondering.
You obviously aren't a fan of Red Green.
That show was hilarious, very rare out here on the west coast. I wonder if it is available on dvd? Mike
Trust in God, but row away from the rocks.
It's still playing on public TV here.
Red Green is hilarious. His DIY repairs and Men's Anonimous meetings are LOL funny.The time he decided to 'help a friend out' by replacing the burnt out headlight in his car is a classic. I laughed so hard I about hurt myself.
Laughed? Watter ya talkin about?? That's all serious stuff.
ROFLMAO.
LOL.
Had to google a bit.
Found this: http://www.officemuseum.com/communications_equipment.htm
Which confirmed what I had remembered, the stopper in the tube ends has a whistle built in. (This half-remembered from a tale told by a relative on dealing with a martinet CPO by dogging the weather stop between flying and weather bridge. Chief High-n-mighty storms in and wants to know why no one answers the speaking tube whistle, and is dissatisfied with "Dint 'ere it, Chief" answer. Chief HnM then opens the speaking tube end to demonstrate the whistle to get a speaking tube-full of water othe the end.)
Well, naught with "catalog" and " "speaking tube" ".