| Name | Teléfono público TRM 100 |
| Date | late 1980s. Used in supervised locations. |
| Manufacturer | Sesa-ITT Alcatel Standard Eléctrica S.A. (SESA), Spain |
| Link | Also used in the USA |
Development of the Teléfono público TRM 100
| Development of the TRM‑100 The TRM‑100 was an electronic coin-operated telephone developed by Standard Eléctrica S.A. (SESA) for Telefónica during the modernisation of Spain’s public telephone network in the late 1980s. It was intended mainly for supervised indoor locations, including cafés, bars, hotels, railway stations and other public premises, rather than exposed street kiosks. Its wedge-shaped moulded casing, electronic display and push-button keypad represented a significant departure from Spain’s earlier heavy electromechanical payphones. The Spanish version accepted 5, 25 and 100-peseta coins. An electronic validation system checked each coin before registering the corresponding credit, while the display showed the available credit and information about the call. The TRM system consisted of the user telephone and a separate control unit connected to the telephone line. A control unit could reportedly manage two telephone instruments, handling tariff programming, call metering, alarms and the accounting of collected coins. This arrangement made the telephone particularly suitable for commercial premises where the equipment could be supervised and the cash box regularly emptied. Most known Spanish examples have Telefónica’s green casing, although red versions also survive. The robust plastic body and compact tabletop or shelf-mounted form placed the TRM‑100 between traditional mechanical coin telephones and the later generation of digitally programmed coin and card payphones. Manufacturer: SESA, ITT and Alcatel Standard Eléctrica S.A., commonly abbreviated SESA, was established in Spain in 1926 and became one of the country’s principal telecommunications manufacturers. It supplied exchanges, ordinary telephones and public telephone equipment to CTNE, the organisation later known as Telefónica. SESA formed part of the international manufacturing empire of the American International Telephone and Telegraph Corporation—ITT. Other related ITT companies included Standard Telephones and Cables in Britain and Australia, Standard Elektrik Lorenz in Germany and Bell Telephone Manufacturing Company in Belgium. During 1986–87, ITT transferred most of its European telecommunications manufacturing interests to the French Compagnie Générale d’Électricité. These businesses were reorganised under the Alcatel name, and Standard Eléctrica subsequently became Alcatel Standard Eléctrica. Consequently, surviving TRM‑100 telephones may be associated with SESA, ITT or Alcatel depending on their date and labelling. American version A version of the TRM‑100 was adapted for the United States, accepting American 5-cent, 10-cent and 25-cent coins. It was distributed around 1987–90 by Payphone Inc., trading as “Payphone of America,” in Clemmons, North Carolina. A 1989 American amusement-industry directory lists Payphone Inc. at P.O. Box 709, Clemmons, with B. G. Hauser as its contact. A 1990 listing describes the company as “formerly Payphone of America.” This evidence places the imported TRM‑100 within America’s rapidly expanding privately operated payphone market, rather than among the public telephones installed by the regional Bell companies. The American model is an unusual example of a Spanish-designed payphone being adapted for private operation in the United States. Its SESA–ITT identification also captures the brief corporate transition between ITT and Alcatel. |
Above- Teléfono público TRM (coin operated)
Leave a Reply