Component level board repair. Watch me fail here!

[Vince]

Hi All, It occurred to me the other day that I come across a silly amount of broken devices in what I do. Sometimes its a broken phone or a broken laptop, other times people come to me with broken monitors and TV's which in the past I have fixed, soldered new caps onto etc but when it comes to things like failed surface mount components on devices such as phones or motherboards I have always just thrown it away and given up.

In this month alone I have come across at least 3 or 4 devices that are in otherwise perfect order bar some odd fault that renders them useless, that got me thinking, why don't I just go and buy the rest of the kit that I need and start attempting to repair some of these things? So when on Tuesday somebody handed me an iPhone 7 which is in otherwise good condition apart from the fact that they cant hear anything anybody is saying on a call or use other audio functions on the device I set about my plan.

To be clear here I replaced this broken iphone 7 with a new xr or whatever the new iphone is called now. This is basically a brick so with the phone being broken anyway why not attempt a repair?

Realising that my butane iron wasn't going to do the job here I ordered the most likely component that can cause this issue in an iphone as well as a whole load of new (but really cheap) kit that I think I will need to carry out this repair then I forgot about it until today when I got home and stuff started turning up.

The idea here is not just this first repair but I might buy some random broken electronics like really old computers as well and see if I can repair them but first i'm going to share with my first attempt at a repair which is going to be this:



A bga audio ic for an iphone 7 which turned up at my door today and cost less than £6, this little thing is tiny but I counted and there are 144 connections between this tiny little chip and the board. This is probably a silly thing to start with but you have to start somewhere right? Even if replacing this thing is silly hard I am still going to give it a try. Over the next few days I will also share the cheap gear I bought as it gets delivered, I might even do a little video of each repair so you can all mock me for my total failures (of which there will be many) and also for the fact that I have pretty much no idea what I am doing.

So what you recon to this one, this iPhone? Success of failure?

 

[Vince]

Louis Rossman?

Must be! That fella knows his stuff though. Me... I know nothing but I am sure it will be interesting to learn a bit!

 

[Vince]

I assume you bought a hot air rework station?

Been thinking of getting one for some projects I have on the side but put it off with an impending house move on the table.

I did but this was a proper cheap one just to get me going! We are talking less than £40. I'll post some pics when it turns up.

 

[Vince]

I'm a bit addicted to watching youtube videos of old computers like the C64/Amiga being repaired and refurbished to a like-new condition. They make it look so easy but i bet if i tried the same i'd make a real hash of it

Then you will be happy as project 2 for this thread is an old Atari ST. I'm also on the look out for an old zx speccy 48k.

 

[Vince]

Not a chance. One or more of the following will happen:

- PCB will warp due to uneven/excessive heating
- “Gnat poo” size components will be displaced by heat source/IC removal tool/unsteady hands
- Solder pads will lift due to excessive heat
- Solder bridges on replacement chip due to misalignment

Well I'm not going to hide my failures so we will see! Personally I'm on the fence and give it something like a 50/50 chance of success, full disclosure, i've been watching board repair videos (mostly Louis Rossman) for about a year which I think has given me a little bit of misplaced confidence, perhaps what I think my ability is vs what it actually is will be way off. If it breaks it will be because of my total incompetence!

 

[Vince]

I don’t mean to be Debbie Downer, but I used to repair mobile phones for Nokia back in the days of ETACS (UK 1G) and they wouldn’t even entertain engineers trying to replace surface mount ICs.

I worked for Apple and the soldering equipment needed just to attach flying leads to enable the monitoring of the various antenna tuning switches cost thousands of dollars and we eventually had to get this done at the factory as we wrecked too many devices trying to do it in the remote offices.

Good luck!

Not at all dude, a bit of reality is essential Should make for some interesting conversation in here as well. I am open to total failure and will fully embrace it!

 

[Vince]

Snip...

His apple rants can be absolutely epic I think for me it was pretty much just confirmation on what I already know. I love the way he proper goes to town on them but is also straight up about the fact that his business is built around their shady practices and that he is not willing to pay to be authorised.

 

[Vince]

I would love to see some pics of your set up for trying to fix this. I'm imagining a desk with clamps and a big magnifying glass on a bendy neck, micro-sized tweezers and a soldering iron so fine it could give an ant an enema.

Your not that far wrong, I have a magnifying glass with clamps and lights, hot air station, my irodo solderpro, volt meter, tweezers, kaptop polimide tape, track tape, IPA, flux etc etc. I shall set it all up on my little portable workstation and get some pics when it is all here but will also grab a few images as things arrive.

 

[Vince]

I know you're not fixing retro items, but GadgetUK164 might be worth watching for some tips.

https://www.youtube.com/user/GadgetUK164/videos

Oh I am as well! I have an Atari ST in line next which was donated to me by a friend this morning! I'm also planning on a zx specky 48k if I can find one that is broken enough, all for no other reason than retro is cool, I would also quite like to play some hitchhikers guide and some other retro games from my childhood. Cheers for the link, I will have a little watch

 

[Vince]

I hope you have a stereo microscope and a lot of spares for trial runs

He's also built an iphone from scratch using refurbished/discarded parts (although he didn't attempt any logic board soldering that time)

But good luck

I don't have an oscilloscope because at this stage it's a bit early to be spending £500 when I'm still finding my feet. Ive put pobably put around £100 in so far but will do a little breakdown as things arrive. I do appreciate that the more of this I decide to do, the more the need for an oscilloscope will likely surface. This is especially the case on older hardware that is particularly sensitive to fluctuations and noise on power rails. I'm sure as all this progresses and I mess about that somebody in here will tell me that it's time to invest

Also just realised you said stereo microscope.. Googled that and nope, going to be using the assets of god for this one.

 

[Vince]

Little update... 5 things arrived today but not the key bits. I'll post some pics of what ive bought and prices! First though I needed a test board so stripped this "broken" board today. The soldered SSD on this one is done and it's an old enough machine that I have no intention of finding parts for it. It's also a machine I have lots of so not at all interested in getting this up and running. First picture bottom top right.. that ic is similar to the one im replacing so ill whip that off and see what happens





Next up some of the soldering tools including all the bits that came today, a bit disappointing as it stands but ill price it all up below, including the stuff still to come and you will be able to see just how much of a tight arse I am being for this at the moment:



Already here:

Solder Wick: £1.89
High Temp Kaptop Polyimide Tape: £8
IPA: £3
Liquid solder Flux: £3.19
Cheap Multimeter: £8.99 (I have like 4 other multimeters so this was a random buy but its got tiny probes)

To Come:

High Precision stainless tweezers: £4
Hot air rework station: £28 (you just know this is going to be a shocker but I remain hopeful )
Magnifying glass / led light soldering stand thing with clamps £10.99
Gel Flux £6

Total Spend on equipment: £74.06.

Things like my old soldering iron that i've had for years and pcb repair tape etc I haven't included.

 

[Vince]

You're going to struggle with SMD soldering using just your eyes, even a jewellers magnifying visor will be better than eyes and doesn't cost much

Oh no I have this magnifying soldering flexible thing with clamps coming, I will use my eyes to look through that

 

[Vince]

can we send you all our broken gpus now

i'd happily pay a decent fee to have you attempt repairs on a dead 280x sitting under my desk at work

How dead is it? What does it do? I want some stuff to work on but wouldn't want any money to change hands. I would even pay postage and send it back if we succeed/fail. Sharing all the fun in here of course If you were up for that and @Maccy and the other lads say it's ok I would love to have a go.

 

[Vince]

I screwed fixing phones and motherboards years ago just not worth the hassle unless its your hobby.

I found over the years it was hit and miss so just gave up in the end.

Your phone screwed buy a new one, you motherboard screwed buy a new one.

Bloody using a hair dryer to open a phone, motherboards don't go there done reflows in the oven, done it with graphics card. Its just not worth it.

This is literally just a bit of fun and to learn something new. Plus a 128gb iPhone 7 is still worth a few quid so rather than pay somebody £130 to fix it, I can spend less than that on stuff and learn something new in the process. I'm not bothered if it breaks, it's one of a fleet of 20 odd phones so that's really not what it's about. It's more about, can a bloke go out and spend £80 odd quid to do something that a professional outfit will charge more than £100 for. I've taken apart so much over the years that something like removing a screen on a phone generally goes decently and isn't much of a problem.

Half the problem here is exactly as your saying, your using the wrong tools for the job Although it can work, you don't use an oven to fix a gpu. It's the same thing when fixing cars, jobs are easy with the right tools and knowledge, without those things it's an insurmountable task.

 

[Vince]

I have no idea about electronics, but I’m glad that a beer is an essential part of your work bench!

It's an essential part of all workbenches, isn't it?

 

[Vince]

I don't have a problem with it, just have to make sure that both parties agree to terms and if anything should get lost in the post who deals with it etc?

Cheers dude. @233, balls in your court dude, if you want to see me attempt to break your gpu further then hit me up with a trust and we can work it out.

 

[Vince]

Gentlemen! I present to you the cheapest of equipment!! It's a shame that the hot air station told me it wouldn't be here until Monday as I left the phone in the office. TBH I'm pretty much set now just waiting on precision tweezers (essential kit!), gel flux and that is about it! Perhaps a bit later ill have a go at ripping some chips off of a board!





Only small issue I have right now then is nothing to fix! That is unless my mate brings up that Atari but still, Ill need parts for that I am sure!

 

[Vince]

Solder cat is watching you.. Solder?

I think solder cat was actually eyeing up the box that it came in You cant blame her, looks a comfortable one!

 

[Vince]

Hmmm this inspires me.

I'd love to say be able to buy a broken pc part gpu etc or cpu and somehow fix it.....

I always fix majority of my stuff but never things like soldering small components etc. Just soldering fixing my headphones drill etc here and there.... I've used same pair of sennheiser hd 595's for about 12 years now because i've repaired them so much. They still sound good though (Compared to my brand new hd 650's that pretty much sit in a box majority of time because I only use them for music editing here and there).

Edit: Also keep us updated on your progress + pics. I'm interested to see how it goes.

I'll keep you updated The iPhone 7 fix will be next week now but I do have a whole bunch of broken iPhone 6 phones plus about 4 iCloud locked devices so I could do something with them even if its just practising removing their audio IC's. I did want to wait until I had some of that gel flux that everybody seems to use but I do have liquid flux so perhaps I could have just a little go. I was going to try and make a semi decent video of the phone repair but if my previous youtube attempts are anything to go by it will be unedited, unscripted and badly filmed with a lot of "errr" involved.

 

[Vince]

I built my own from a spare 120mm fan, 12v DC power supply, a charcoal filter and a 3d printed housing

I modified the design from this - https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:17086 so I could add a Rocker Switch/Kettle Plug adapter and to house the power supply all in one unit, total cost was about £10

Thats awesome... I could put some carbon filter in it that I have in the garage, I have a load of small ITX power supplies as well as some 120mm fans... I recon I can make a little extractor. and I could also get it all 3d printed... hmmm

If you modified that to be a bit longer than a itx supply you could also make a housing for the whole thing in 1 unit as you say. I think I might do this, mind you I think I could easily make a better/different one out of a load of wood I have and that won't cost me a penny.