Retro Phone Phone Charging Station

I love the look of a vintage rotary phone and had a couple of them lying around begging to be brought back to life. In a fit of inspiration, I decided to marry form and function. Thus the Retro Phone Phone Charging Station is born.

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Step 1: Gather Tools and Materials

Tools you will need:

1. Soldering iron
2. Drill with a bit slightly larger than your charger cord
3. Miscellaneous screwdrivers
4. Wire strippers
5. Scissors or something else that will cut through cable ties
6. Helping hands or lots of patience

1. Obviously you need a phone. Mine is a desk model rotary, but I see no reason a touch tone, wall, princess or any other kind would work. Look on craigslist, ebay, garage sales or post on freecycle. Maybe grandma has one in the attic. You never know.

2. The wall charger that works with your cell phone. I have a Samsung Gravity, so I had to buy an adapter specific to it. I got lucky and found a nice slim one at "The Shack" that has folding prongs and an additional USB port, which as you will see increases the usefulness of the device.

3. Any ol' car charger with a coiled cord. These are a dime a dozen.

4. Shrink tubing and solder

5. Cable ties and/or twist ties

That's it.

twocvbloke says: Jan 27, 2012. 1:33 AM

Personally, I'd get one of them USB ATA devices to use the phone with skype, seeing a WE 500 C/D, or any vintage phone, being abused like this is quite disheartening, that phone's a classic, and looks wrong having a cheap phone charger dangling from it's earpiece... :(

brandegor (author) says: Jan 29, 2012. 9:16 AM

Hi. I took great care not to damage the phone and saved all of the parts. I respect your opinion, though, and the point for me was charging my cell phone. Sorry you don't like it.