Wiring a old telephone bell to a doorbell

[inky]

I have recently moved into a new house and can't hear the door half the time - and people keep moaning at me for leaving them standing out in the cold!

I have an old telephone extension bell in the hall of the house and I'd like to wire it up to the door bell. This is what it looks like:

I have followed the wiring into the cellar and it has the following coloured wires attached: Green, Brown, Blue and Orange. Here is another little picture:

As you can see the green and brown wires are connected to the green and brown wires that are sheathed with the brown flex.

What I need to know primarilly is could this be connected up so it rang when someone pressed a door bell switch?

If it is possible what would I need to do to do this?

Thanks in advance for any help you can give me on this - it is far too cold and nasty at the moment for me to leave people standing on the door step!

Ta,

inky

 

[nstreet]

What voltage is the telephone bell rated at, my guess would be around the 50v mark. If your doorbell connection is via mains it wont last long

Thats an artistic piece of wiring, I assume you will be tidying it up and putting it in a nice little junction box.

 

[Steve]

Thats a bloody ugly bell, bit of an eyesore, an antique. I would buy a new compact bell rated at 12V DC and a 12V DC transformer, specifically for this purpose. This would be easy to wire up, and very likely to work first time . . .

And because its a smaller bell, doesn't mean its any quieter . . . fix it to a wooden wall for full effect . . . or get one of those 12V buzzers - very loud.

 

[plugwash]

its a telephone bell and the ring voltage for those is about 100V AC at 12.5hz iirc so this raises a couple of issues.

1: normal bell pushes aren't rated that high
2: if you just use a transformer off the mains you will have a cuircuit that can drive a LOT more current than a phone line and will consequently be much more dangerous.
3: if you just use a transformer off the mains the frequency will be wrong i'm not sure if this will actually be a problem.

 

[breezer]

put the bell on an auction site and buy the proper kit, safer, less hassle, cheaper and will work first time