The Obsidian Block

The Redstone Guide: A Doorbell

• By: KruSuPhy
• June 30, 2011
• Redstone Tutorials, Tutorials
• 1

Redstone. The complicated, albeit very useful ‘wiring’ of Minecraft. Since the days of Minecraft Alpha when it was added, users have been creating extraordinary mechanisms using redstone. For some people, usage came naturally and they jumped right into making large computers, systems, and circuits. For other people, though… it wasn’t that simple. And even still, some people don’t understand a redstone torch from a RS NOR Latch(which, by the way, are very different!).

Well, that can be remedied! In the coming weeks, I will be showing you many different redstone contraptions and how they work. In one article a week, I will be showing you many different redstone machines, how they work, what they require to work, and how to make them!

Now, for week one, I’ve chosen one of the most simple redstone machines I could think of: A simple doorbell.

As I’m sure you know, a doorbell is something that will play a sound to alert you to a visitor’s presence. This is a very simple machine, requiring:

• 3 Redstone wire(Plus however much it takes to get from the button to the circuit)
• 1 Redstone repeater
• 2 Note blocks

This doorbell is made by hooking one noteblock directly to the redstone wire, and the other noteblock through a repeater on the fourth setting(the longest delay). We want the doorbell to give the *Ding-Dong* sound, instead of playing both sounds at the same time. For every setting on a repeater(1-2-3-4), it waits .1 second. Therefore, on the fourth setting, it will wait .4 seconds to play the second sound.

This means that when someone presses the button, it will instantly play the first note block’s sound(whatever you have it set to), and also power up the delay in the repeater. After .4 seconds, it’ll power the noteblock as well, and cause the second sound to play.

Here is a screenshot of the doorbell being used practically:

Did you notice that I put the doorbell 2 blocks away from the door? The button would power the door if it were placed directly adjacent to it, and by powering the door, it would open it. Which completely ruins the point in having a doorbell.