Toys4RJill

So one of my favourite hobbies is looking through old brochures. A lot of cars on the late 80s and early 90s had cellular cell phones in the car installed directly from the factory.

Does anyone know if these cellular phones still work? Can you get a subscription? Anyone know someone who still uses them?

So for fun today, I was looking at the 1996 Cadillac Fleetwood. It comes with a "new integrated analog/digital voice activated phone".

Any thoughts or comments?

geko29

A few companies still make them, for new installations in vehicles that are commonly in rural areas where handsets may not have enough range.

Very few of the older ones will work. The vast majority were analog (AMPS), and the digital ones were TDMA or IS-95 (the first revision of CDMA). Rogers and AT&T shut down the last AMPS and TDMA networks almost a decade ago (2007/8) in favor of GSM. IS-95 was superseded by CDMA2000, and Verizon completed their conversion in 2002.

JDR76

My coworker has a '95 LS400 with the built in phone. She told me "my car is the only car I'll ever need. I'll never get rid of it, and will be buried in it, but don't worry, I can't call you from the grave. The phone doesn't work."

Sulu

Analog cellphones and analog bands of dual-band (analog and digital) cellphones will no longer work.

Digital bands may still work, assuming that their radio technology is compatible with the new digital radio technology and frequencies now in use. But they may have limited coverage area because the older phones may not be able to access the new cell towers that have gone up since then. If the old phones do work, coverage in and around larger cities should be acceptable, but what was once fringe or non-covered area may not be available to the older phones.

What I am saying is that if the old phones still work, they may still be stuck with 1990s coverage.

Hoovey689

iTrader: (16)

Here's a question, most States its illegal not to be hands-free. Do these laws apply to cars with built in phones? We had a 2005 Maserati Quattroporte trade-in and it had one.

bitkahuna

iTrader: (20)

^^^ built in car phones typically had a 'speaker' feature so you didn't have to hold the handset.

back then i had a motorola phone 'installed' in my '94 legend GS sedan. baller.

mmarshall

Unfortunately, that doesn't stop millions of double-minded drivers. In my area, probably one out of every five (a rough estimate, just from what I myself observe) are steering with one hand and holding the phone the other.

Varies state-to-state, but, as I understand it, in most cases, you're OK if it's hands-free. However, that doesn't mean that's it actually much safer, since the most recent studies show that is the act of having the brain try and concentrate on two different functions at once (driving and talking), even hands-free, that causes the distractions, more so than simply holding the phone itself.

Hoovey689

iTrader: (16)

Oh good to know.

Legend GS

T0ked

iTrader: (2)

All carriers now require a phone to have GPS functions available to be reactivated (for 911). So most of those phones can't be activated again. I still have an adapter for the 2000 S500. It came with a puck that could connect the system to the original Motorola RAZR flip phone.

jwong77

That is baller status! Back in the day that was most certainly a slick ride.

bitkahuna

iTrader: (20)

thanks guys, it was an awesome car. 6 speed stick too.

will never forget the day i sold it privately and the person buying it was so excited they could barely contain themselves.

i too was excited as i'd just got my 2000 GS400 to replace it.

SW17LS

I actually still have somewhere my Dad's first car phone. Back then car phones were so expensive you uninstalled them from your old car and reinstalled them in your new car. He had two different ones, one that he had in his 1987 Chrysler Fifth Avenue which he transferred into his 1990 Lincoln Continental (thats the one I have). He put that one in my Mom's Aerostar van (we were ballin!) and he put a new one in the Lincoln and then transferred that new one into his 95 Cadillac STS when he got that. Then he got the LS400 and it had a built in phone.

Aron9000

No car phone, but my 1991 Cadillac Brougham did have a CB radio in it when I got it. I took it out, the previous owner had this huge CB antenna that mounted to the rear bumper that looked ridiculous. Thank goodness the antenna clamped onto the rear bumper and he didn't drill holes in the body/bumper to mount that monstrosity.

Byprodrive

iTrader: (1)

Motorola Pulsar II I don't leave home without it!

FrankReynoldsCPA

The one in my LS400 was long gone by the time the car came into my possession.

What a world. We recently upgraded my dad from a first-gen iPhone to a new Moto G. He's been getting a real kick out of the voice search and hands free function. I went for a drive with him on Saturday and was showing him the voice commands in my Fusion. It's amazing that he grew up with cars that had no seat belts and their phone was a party line.

I still laugh when I watch Die Hard and see the limo kid using the car-phone.