During reenacting events, I usually hook up two or three field telephones to my switchboard so visitors can talk on 80+ year old German equipment. This requires short lengths of telephone wire. Winding up the wire and storing it when not in use presented a problem. The wire would get tangled and become a real mess. That’s where the Aufrollvorrichtung would come in handy.
Authentic WW2 Aufrollvorrichtungen are extremely rare, especially outside the EU. When the become available, they are extremely expensive, considering that they are made from bent and welded steel rod.
All I needed for reenacting was a reasonable facsimile. So, I thought, “Why not make my own?” I can’t weld, but I can solder. I also don’t have metal forming machinery. So, I decided to make my Aufrollvorrichtungen out of 1/8-inch brass rod, in five pieces, soldered together.
To make a Aufrollvorrichtung, I first cut four 6-inch pieces of rod. To cut, I used a cut-off disc in my Dremel tool. So I get a nice bend, I heated two of the pieces with my butane torch to anneal (soften) them.
Once the annealed rods were cooled, I bent them around a wooden dowel. A wooden closet pole works well for this.
Once the two rod pieces were bent, it was time to solder the four pieces together.
I placed the pieces on a ceramic tile, coated them with soldering flux, and placed a small length of silver solder in the joint.
I then applied heat with my butane torch to melt the solder. I used a cutoff wheel to trim the U-shaped pieces flush with the ends of the straight pieces.
I cut a straight cross piece, fluxed it, and soldered it in place. To improve the strength of the solder joints, I use the cut off wheel to notch the ends of the cross piece.
I used my belt sander to slightly taper the ends of the Aufrollvorrichtungen. After sanding, I painted them black.
Note: Each Aufrollvorrichtung is only about 6 inches long, and about 1.5 inches wide. Nevertheless, they still allow me to coil up significant lengths of wire.
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WW2 German Field Telephone Equipment 