[PRCo] Re: SLPS/SHRT/PTC/MUNI PCC Question

[Herb Brannon]

Impossible. See the attached photo of a St Petersburg Tram model of St Louis
Public Service PCC #1700. This is the best photo of this device I have seen.
On Fri, Nov 19, 2010 at 12:16, Fred Schneider <fwschneider at comcast.net>wrote:

> Try an air-vent.   It remained behind the back-up pole that Muni added.
>
>
> On Nov 18, 2010, at 10:12 PM, Herb Brannon wrote:
>
> > The PRCo original "radio phone" did not use radio waves to transmit the
> > audio directly to the car. It was a telephone based device using the
> trolley
> > wire to transmit. Hence the name "radio phone". That is the basic
> definition
> > of the PRCo system from former PRCo/PATransit Training Instructor Angelo
> > Nazzo. He always referred to it as the "trolley phone". Angelo would
> always
> > tell us how superior the PATransit standard radio system was in
> comparison
> > to the "trolley phone". The main complaint with the trolley phone was
> that
> > the voice clarity was very poor. PATransit kept insisting, for years
> after
> > radios had been installed in buses, that it would not be prudent to
> install
> > them in streetcars do to the poor quality experienced in the original
> > installation. PAT was forgetting that there was a vast difference between
> > the original PRCo radio installation of 1949 and the radio system in use
> at
> > PATransit in 1971. By 1977 all streetcars, with the exception of a
> handful
> > of non-rehabilitated 1600s, had radios installed.
> > On Thu, Nov 18, 2010 at 21:24, Phillip Clark Campbell <pcc_sr at yahoo.com
> >wrote:
> >
> >> Mr.Brannon;
> >> It has the appearance of an 'antenna' doesn't it.  Prc used radio
> >> phones on some of the interurbans but don't remember an antenna.
> >> Seems the radio signal was overlaid on existing wiring.
> >> The item you describe appears to be about 6' long and generally
> >> assumes the curvature of the roof.  Much smaller similar devices
> >> were used for antennas on cars decades later;  didn't Pat have
> >> a U-shaped antenna mounted near the roof light?
> >>
> >>
> >> Phil
> >> Without  a   'coast'   but  not  a   'cause.'
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >> ________________________________
> >> From: Herb Brannon <hrbran at cavtel.net>
> >> To: pittsburgh-railways at dementia.org
> >> Sent: Thu, November 18, 2010 8:58:50 PM
> >> Subject: [PRCo] SLPS/SHRT/PTC/MUNI PCC Question
> >>
> >> For those who have a copy of PCC-From Coast to Coast handy. Take a look
> at
> >> the section on St Louis Public Service Co.and the 1600s and 1700s in
> >> particular. The SLPS 1600-series and 1700-series PCCs have a small
> device
> >> mounted on the roof just back from the top of the destination sign. It
> >> appears to have a bracket in the center and is made from a tube shaped
> >> piece
> >> of metal, attached to the bracket and extending to both the right and
> left
> >> sides of the car roof. I can find no mention of this device in any of my
> >> books. When SLPS sold their cars to Shaker Heights Rapid Transit,
> >> Philadelphia Transportation Co and the San Francisco Municipal Railway
> the
> >> device was missing when the cars arrived in their new homes. Does anyone
> >> know the purpose of this device?
> >> --
> >> Herb Brannon
> >> In Cuyahoga Valley National Park
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >
> >
> > --
> > Herb Brannon
> > In Cuyahoga Valley National Park
> >
> >
> >
>
>
>
>


-- 
Herb Brannon
In Cuyahoga Valley National Park



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