Gas Station Bell

[TAKerry]

May be a simple question. In the not so old days, there was a line (air hose?) in front of the gas pumps. When a car drove over the bell rang. The guy in the shop came out and pumped the gas, checked the oil etc. 

How does this work?  As a kid I was fascinated by these things. Havent thought about them for years, watching an old movie on tv just sparked some memories. I would assume a break in air pressure?

[padgett]

Pressure increase in air hose tripped a NO (normally open) switch and rang bell. When car drive off hose resumed original shape.

[46 woodie]

When we were kids, there was a gas station on the corner. The mechanic/owner would have his head under the hood of a car in one of his bay's and we would jump on the hose and ring the bell. He would come out of the garage and see no cars and yell that he was "gonna get you kids". Ah the good old days.

[Flivverking]

Many/most bells were mounted outside the building..You still see some on old revamped to convenience/stations and are painted over so they are hard to notice..

They bell was really only good for the slow ,one man garage, gas station.

 

We disconnected one at my friends Mobile Gas and service center in the late 70's ..There was enough crew on duty.

Those were near the last days of attendent(jockey) washing  windshields ,but only checking oil only when asked.

Then we/they fixed tubeless flats for free...(99% always was tipped a buck or two).

 

 

[Frank DuVal]

Still available. 

 

https://www.miltonindustries.com/self-contained-driveway-signal-bell

 

 

3 hours ago, padgett said:

Pressure increase in air hose tripped a NO (normally open) switch and rang bell.

Nope, pressure increase in hose trips bell clapper without any electricity!👍

[8E45E]

1 minute ago, Frank DuVal said:

https://www.miltonindustries.com/self-contained-driveway-signal-bell

 

 

Nope, pressure increase in hose trips bell clapper without any electricity!👍

The service station I worked at was solenoid operated, which required electricity.

 

Craig

 

[Frank DuVal]

You had the fancy upscale version!😄

[joe_padavano]

31 minutes ago, Frank DuVal said:

You had the fancy upscale version!😄

 

Actually, Frank, the photo in the Milton link you posted shows that the bell has a power cord in addition to the air hose connection. 😉

 

[f.f.jones]

You need electricity to power the bell, not inflate the hose. Read the specifics on the Milton website. Also check the sound samples provided...the silver bell and its sound is what I remember from way back.

[jukejunkie1015]

I want one!! Just don't know where to put it so the neighbor kids won't find it. It may not be a phone or a computer but some of those kids sure know how to needle the old guy next door with all the unusual toys.

 

Kurt M

 

[TAKerry]

Yea, I suppose I should have done a google first, but what they hey, I got a few guys nostalgic. I too saw that you can get new and also many originals on ebay.  I am planning on getting one just because. I have a perfect spot in my drive. Many years ago we had a VERY long driveway which the entrance wasnt visible. Pop had an alarm company put up an infrared eye. It was hard wired and the signal and receiver were mounted in boxes that were about a foot tall. The bell rang in the living room when ever it was tripped. It was quite advanced for the day, no one I knew had ever seen anything like it. Now theyre kinda common place. Problem with the system was he had a brick wall entrance on each side of the lane, which abutted a deep culvert. NO WAY for a car to get in there without tripping the alarm. It made it VERY hard to sneak in late, of which I may or may not have done many a time!

[rocketraider]

Then you should have one!😎 

 

My folks didn't need anything like that infrared setup. They had a stupid son who liked loud mufflers and winding an engine out. Mama said she could hear me coming soon as I turned off the four-lane onto the county road- half a mile from the house!

 

For a kid who liked loud cars, the mufflers kids now have on Mustangs and especially these ridiculous Carolina Squat trucks get on my nerves!😬

[TerryB]

During high school, 1968-70 I worked at a small Cities Service-Citgo station in NE PA.  The sound of one of those bells is permanently ingrained in my memory. Kids would try to ring it with their bicycles, people would drive in during a downpour or snow storm for a $1 worth of gas and when I was ready to close up and go home to do homework at 10PM they would pull in for a little gas and a complete under the hood inspection for oil, coolant battery, tires and anything else they could think of.  They are part of the experience that only those who lived it will remember.  The local pump it yourself gas and self serve hot dog emporium has no such wonderful device.

[Mark Huston]

My first job, starting in 1975 when I was a junior in high school, was working in a full service Gulf gas station. I spent three years working in that gas station and I will never forget the sound of that bell.  

[dalef62]

Still have one at my shop, not in use anymore but still hanging on the wall.

[Frank DuVal]

21 hours ago, joe_padavano said:

Actually, Frank, the photo in the Milton link you posted

Got to quit looking up things on my small phone.....😁

[Str8-8-Dave]

I remember these at Williams Bros Sunoco in Westland, MI where I worked as a teenager into my early 20's.  One end of the hose was connected to the bell and the other lay across the drive with a bolt jammed into the end of it to cap it off so when a car ran over it it would set the bell off, except when Big Jack Batten left for the day going round the front of the office past the gas pumps with rear wheels smoking under his 421 Super Duty Pontiac 2+2...  He cut that hose a couple of times which usually resulted in 3 or 4 cars backed up on the driveway we didn't know were there waiting for service and my boss Jim Williams didn't like that.   Big Jack always had a couple of jobs going, he worked for awhile at Carpenter Dodge in Wayne, then drove wrecker for Williams Bros or FE Davidson Sunoco and later worked at the Ford Livonia Transmission & Chassis plant.  Jack was built like a tank and looked like the old wrestler Bulldog Brower, always had a Pall Mall straight burning in his mouth and always had a story following him.  He went out one snowy night after 11PM on a wrecker call to pull some drunkard's T-Bird back onto the road.  It turned out to be a winch job with snow up to Jack's knees.  When Jack told the guy that would be fifty bucks the guy said "OK I'll stop in and pay you in the morning" Jack must not have been convinced.  When he pulled back into the drive at Williams Bros there was a rear seat cushion out a T-bird in the back of the truck!  The guy did come in the next morning to pay his towing bill and recover his seat cushion...

[hook]

I remember in some cases a car would stop on the line just right and the bell would go off and continue until we had the car moved just a little. Another bell I remember and miss is the bell in the gas pump that dinged every time a gallon registered. Sometimes in the summer when it's quiet and I hear a distant sound like that bell, a thousand and one memories flash through my mind. Oh well, sorry for the nostalgia trip.

 

Hook

[TerryB]

The pumps at the station I worked for only registered $9.99, for $10 they went back $0.00 but the gallons continued so on the rare occasion you pumped more than $10 you had to remember the roll over amount. Gas was $0.299 for regular. Customers would say “fill it or $5”.  What a change from today.

[8E45E]

8 hours ago, Str8-8-Dave said:

I remember these at Williams Bros Sunoco in Westland, MI where I worked as a teenager into my early 20's.  One end of the hose was connected to the bell and the other lay across the drive with a bolt jammed into the end of it to cap it off so when a car ran over it; it would set the bell off.

That definitely brings back memories of an Esso station I worked at in the early 1980's.  One can see the hose in the photo I took of it here: https://forum.studebakerdriversclub.com/forum/your-studebaker-forum/stove-huggers-the-non-studebaker-forum/1876859-wonderful-vendo-promotion-film

 

Craig

[TAKerry]

1 hour ago, TerryB said:

The pumps at the station I worked for only registered $9.99, for $10 they went back $0.00 but the gallons continued so on the rare occasion you pumped more than $10 you had to remember the roll over amount. Gas was $0.299 for regular. Customers would say “fill it or $5”.  What a change from today.

I started driving in 1980. Gas had literally just hit the dollar mark. Up until that point the pumps cost per gallon was only registered in cents. All of the pumps would have a paper $1 taped in front.

[dl456]

Gates still make the special hose for these bells.

I have one at my shop at home.

Dennis

[padgett]

So just bump kid's prices by a factor of 10 for everything. For some reason for me a gallon of milk has always paced a gallon of gas. Direct was 18c for regular and 20c for Ethyl when Ed's Eyetalian V-12 was new.. On $3 you could drive all night. Helped that I did not smoke: was $2.35/carton.

 

Real pain was when a coke (6 3/4 oz & plant location was on the bottom of the green bottle) went from a nickel to six cents. Oh the horrors.

[Paul Dobbin]

I too was the pump jocky who responed to that bell.  In the late 60's, just finished with 4.3 years of militarty service, half of it overseas, I worked in a GULF station in North Redingron Beach Florida.   Not a mechanic but the oil change and car wash guy, I had to service the pump island customers.

The owner of that station kept a 1953 Allard Roadster that had a Cadillac engine in the wash bay.   I tried to sell car wash jobs, then I would have to move the Allard.   

[Jim Bollman]

I had forgotten the bell. Never officially worked at a gas station but hung out at the local Shell most of my high school years. My best friend worked there part time and it became the hang out place for the gear heads in our circle of friends. We would pump gas when everyone was busy and the owner would let us use the wash bay for free and the lift if he wasn't using it. The other thing the owner of the Shell station did for those that hung out is he kept the big Coke bottles in the bottom two slots of the Coke machine, the other slots had the little bottles. Those that just stopped to grab a bottle would grab the more convenient upper bottles. We got a few looks when we were all drinking the big bottles but no one said anything. Now I hear the bell just as clear as back in the mid 60s.