Identify this socket...

[Anon84]

Hi, I was hoping someone might be able to help me identify this wall socket in my house. Its been bugging me for years and searching online doesn't bring anything up.

Thanks.

 

[Darkwood]

Welcome to the forum Anon84 ..... It's not anything I recognise as been an electrical point, can you explain it's location and why you think it's a socket plate?

 

[Bobster]

It's a fork cleaner. Just stick one in, you'll see.

 

[DuaneMHunt1976]

To me it just looks like a air vent.. but if you could give the whole picture what is around it as well as some means of being able to see how tall it is ..

a few dabs of white and i think yellow paint on it

 

[Anon84]

The whole pattern of slots covers about a 1" x 3/4" area. Its in the centre of a wall mounted plate of the same dimensions as a single 3-pin electrical socket plate. It's mounted 8-10 inches off the floor in the corner of my living room, near the aerial point, on an internal wall.

I'll get a better picture when I get home later and will unscrew it to see whats behind it, if anything. I hadn't considered the possibility of it being a vent with it being so small but you never know.

 

[TheatreSparks]

At a very rough guess, it is a socket for a very old cable television system, sometimes run by Rediffusion or similar. Behind it you should find a multi core cable similar to phone cable with several tightly twisted pairs in it.

 

[snowhead]

Early CATV, maybe Rediffusion.
Rediffusion used to fit sockets in 2 rooms, 1 for TV and 1 for Radio

Those Sockets are valuable apparently; strange 12 pin socket | DIYnot Forums

 

[Poptasticdave]

Looks exactly like very old (1960's) multicore computer interconnect cable terminations to me. The plugs to mate with it used to have a thick (1/4") bakelite base with the prongs embedded init, solder tag terminals on the rear, and plastic boot to cover the soldered and then a steel cover with external strain relief. Great big ugly things and the cable going into them used to be very flexible and soft but looked thick enough to be for a shower supply... it was mainly rubber sheath, screening and inner braid though. Never seen one in a wall plate before - only on the back of equipment cabinets. If you ever visit National Computer Museum at Bletchley Park you will see hundreds of the things on old mainframe machines.