There’s a Bit of a Hang-Up at Sheriff’s Dept.

The Orange County Sheriff’s Department’s new phone system has not been a ringing success since beginning this weekend.

If you tried to reach out and touch a deputy or a coroner Wednesday but couldn’t get through, it was probably because the fancy new system was down to about one operational line, according to a harried sheriff’s deputy who connected with one caller only after two dozen rings.

The 911 emergency number, which is on a separate system, has not been affected by the switch. But non-emergency callers met only repeated busy signals or dead lines.

“Tolerable, just tolerable,” said Lt. Tom Connor when asked how the phones were working Wednesday. He said he hopes that “they’ll be able to get rid of this hum you’re hearing, though.”

Fred Voss, manager of telephone systems for the county’s General Service Administration, admitted that “we’re experiencing some problems.”

This weekend, the sheriff’s office became the county’s fourth building to switch from the old Centrex telephone system to a $15.2-million one installed by Contel Business Networks, Voss said.

The new system should be operating throughout the county by April, saving taxpayers $30 million in the next 10 years, he said.

The system will route calls from Pacific Bell or GTE networks into the county’s private network connected by a microwave transmission system.

The first switch came June 27 at the county’s North Court building in Fullerton. Two other buildings were added last weekend.

“We’ve had no problems at the other sites,” a somewhat mystified Voss said.

While there have been “intermittent difficulties” on the new system since the switch, most of the numbers on the old system are still working anyway, Voss said. And the “intermittent difficulties” are under investigation.