Your speaker is probably fine. This is one of the most common things people write to us about, and most of the time nothing is broken.
The Speaker Block cannot make a sound from the Battery Block on its own. A battery puts out steady power, and steady power gives a speaker nothing to play. It needs a signal, and in the Intro to Circuits Kit that signal comes from the Siren Sound IC Block.
The circuit you want is Battery Block, then Siren Sound IC Block, then Speaker Block. A single click or a crackle when you connect the speaker straight to the battery is the speaker doing exactly what it should.
Step 1. Find the Siren Sound IC Block
Look for the purple block. This trips people up: the printed booklet shows this block in dark blue, and production shipped it purple. If you have been hunting for a blue block and cannot find one, you already have the right part in your hand.
Step 2. Stack the three blocks in the right order
- Start with the Battery Block.
- Put the Siren Sound IC Block on top of it, with the + on the IC lined up with the + on the battery.
- Put the Speaker Block on top of that, touching the SPKR contact and the - contact.
- Press each block down firmly as you add it.
If you get a siren sound, you are done.
Step 3. Follow the build in the printed guide
The build is Quick Start 2, "Simple Sound", on page 3 of the printed Learning Guide that came in your kit. Pages 17 and 18 have further sound builds once this one works.
If your guide has gone missing, every Intro Kit PDF is on the Intro to Circuits Kit resources page.
Step 4. Watch it being built
Watching it go together is usually faster than reading it. The build-along videos for the Intro Kit are linked from the Intro to Circuits Kit resources page.
Step 5. Still only crackling? Break in the pins
New spring pins are stiff and they occasionally need working in before the connection is solid.
- Lift the Speaker Block off, press it back down, and repeat five or six times.
- Do the same with the Siren Sound IC Block.
- Reassemble and press everything down hard.
Step 1 of My LED, motor or block isn't working has the full break-in instructions.
Step 6. Check the block has not come apart
Some IC blocks can separate into two halves, especially after enthusiastic disassembly. One reported "faulty Siren IC" turned out to be a block whose two halves had come apart and dropped into the foam of the case. Have a look in the case tray before you write in.
When it really is a fault
Treat it as a fault, and write to us, if:
- the Siren Sound IC Block is in the circuit, in the right order, with the pins broken in, and you get nothing or only a crackle; or
- it made a proper siren sound before and now only crackles.
Both of these do happen and we replace the part, free, with nothing to send back. Send us your order number and tell us which block it is. A short video of the three blocks going together helps us more than a photo here, because we can hear what the speaker is doing.
Building the Patrol Car?
The Patrol Car's siren chip may need rotating 180 degrees at step 53. That one is on the first production run notes page, along with the other printing and part quirks from the early kits.
