01-03-2019, 08:18 AM
You can, and I actually did get the replacement part I needed before I tried to fix her, but the issue is actually doing it, not getting the parts.
She has a pullstring and a voice box that's basically a tiny record inside of a box with an o-ring. The o-ring deteriorates over time, and that's why she stops talking. The issue is that Chatty Cathy wasn't meant to be taken apart. So to get to her insides you have to literally saw her in half on the seams along her sides, and then also cut open the voice box. But this particular Chatty is an older model, which is a lot harder to get into the voice box for than the slightly later ones. Even a lot of professional Chatty Cathy repairers don't offer to fix the older dolls because it's very hard to get into the box without completely ruining it.
I tried for several weeks to get into it before eventually giving up, and by then all the sawing I'd done on it had made her voice sound even worse. She made unintelligible garbles before, now it's just one tiny noise. But that's okay! I ended up buying a second one that had been professionally repaired and she sounds great. She's a couple of years newer than this one, from 1962 or 1963, can't remember which. So she has the later voice box and also actually says a few more phrases. My two have different hair and eye colors so they are pretty different dolls!
She has a pullstring and a voice box that's basically a tiny record inside of a box with an o-ring. The o-ring deteriorates over time, and that's why she stops talking. The issue is that Chatty Cathy wasn't meant to be taken apart. So to get to her insides you have to literally saw her in half on the seams along her sides, and then also cut open the voice box. But this particular Chatty is an older model, which is a lot harder to get into the voice box for than the slightly later ones. Even a lot of professional Chatty Cathy repairers don't offer to fix the older dolls because it's very hard to get into the box without completely ruining it.
I tried for several weeks to get into it before eventually giving up, and by then all the sawing I'd done on it had made her voice sound even worse. She made unintelligible garbles before, now it's just one tiny noise. But that's okay! I ended up buying a second one that had been professionally repaired and she sounds great. She's a couple of years newer than this one, from 1962 or 1963, can't remember which. So she has the later voice box and also actually says a few more phrases. My two have different hair and eye colors so they are pretty different dolls!
