Building my own live doorbell and phone

[gspalding]

Hi.

Looking for guidance/plans etc. for building a live doorbell/buzzer box and a separate live phone ring box.

Purchase is not out of the question, if cheap enough.

Any help is greatly appreciated.

Thanks.

George Spalding

[derekleffew]

For the doorbell/buzzer box, look no further than your local home improvement center. In the electrical aisle, most have diagrams and mock-ups. If uneasy about working with electricity, consult a qualified professional.

For the phone ring, see Tele-Q.

[epimetheus]

For the phone ring, could you not just play a sound effect? That's what I just did in a show and it worked pretty well. Certainly cheaper than a dedicated ring generator like the the Tele-Q Derek suggested. (Though the Tele-Q is a pretty cool device.)

Edit: You could use a SFX for the door bell as well. They are actors right? Now that I think about it, since you are specifically asking, you've probably ruled out the use of sound effects.

[Van]

Big vote for the Tele-Q I know when I bought mine it was something like 99.95 I don't know what they run now, but they have adjustments for pitch, pulse speed etc. and they sure make phones easy.

[cutlunch]

A google search brings up thousands of circuits for telephone ringers.

I modified a circuit like the one below.
CircuitDB | Telephone Ring Generator Using Small Power Transformer

This will do what you want as it is.
You just need to change a resistor value to change the interval between rings.

But if you want something more flexible you could use a microcontroller to give you more options.

I took the part of the circuit from the output of NE556 ie the 10K resistor Transistor, transformer, capacitor to generate the ringing.

I programmed a PICAXE 08M chip ( PICAXE )to produce the correct ring frequency and timing to demonstrate different party line rings for a museum.
The unit gets used every day.

By using a microcontroller you could setup different ring frequencies and ring patterns.
Eg manuals phones had a different ring frequency then automatic telephones.
A US phone is typically a single ring while a British phone is a double ring.

The good thing about this circuit is that when the person pickups the phone it stops ringing. It doesn't require the operator to get the timing exactly right as a sound effect does. Although ringing will be heard in the earpiece so the operator should let go of the button on the ringer as soon as possible after the phone is picked up. This is so you don't deafen the actor.

If you have a Basic Stamp microcontroller lying around this will also work for this project.

Using a PICAXE the parts for this came to under $20.

Another search quickly brings up door bell circuits such as the links on this page.
Door bell circuit using NE555

Although for a doorbell it might be just as quick to buy one from the hardware store.

For those that sound effects might be simpler they can be.
But also timing issues can be a problem.
Also the sound may not appear to be coming from where the object is.

For a production of Cabaret the phones were permanetly on the tables on stage.
I built a small exchange switch for the SM that could connect the different phones in the right order. So when someone on stage rang the phone on the table no. refered to in the song the phone on that table rang . The SM also had a magneto generator so he could ring the other phones as need in the song when on stage actor wasn't responsible.

People were very complimentary about it.

Sound effects can be easier depending on the set design.

[cutlunch]

Big vote for the Tele-Q I know when I bought mine it was something like 99.95 I don't know what they run now, but they have adjustments for pitch, pulse speed etc. and they sure make phones easy.

I just had a quick look at the Tele-Q site.
To get the right ring cadence does the operator have to hold and release the button at the right time? Ie does it keep the phone ringing continously while the button is held down?

That's why I like the microcontroller based idea better as you can have multiple frequencies / ring cadences set so you don't have to open a box up for different phones.

[Arez]

If you happen to have a step down transformer handy, you can do it with a real phone.

I don't know why but one of the theatres I work at has a stockpile of unused transformers, that's how I made my phone ring.

[n1ist]

You need more than just a transformer since the ringing voltage (at least in the US) is 90V 20Hz, not 60Hz.

The micro feeding a backwards transformer is the best solution for building one.
/mike