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Would a nand flex be a good way to salvage this board? Or would that end up raising the overall difficulty.
Worklog Nemo's G-wii worklog
- Thread starter NemoInSlumberland
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A NAND flex board is a much easier way to do the relocation but I will say, if you're having trouble cleaning your current setup I don't think the relocation is going to be any easier for you.
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After struggling with this for hours over several days, and taking a break due to a (possibly related) breakout eye infection requiring treatment by an eye specialist, I think I have cleared the bridge. I somehow doubt that this board is even remotely functional though. What do you think?
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It's hard to tell whether or not the NAND legs are actually soldered to the pads on the board at this point. That being said, it doesn't look like there's any bridging. Check for continuity between the top of each pin (as far away from the pad as possible) and the corresponding via to see if they're all still connected.
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Trace 3 and 4 are still bridged, surprisingly none of the pads lifted. I'm thinking about trying to lift the bridged pins and route more copper wires to connect them, because I don't think I can remove the solder that's bridging the pins.
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My neighbor suggested avoiding soldering directly to the pins and instead scratching off the coating from the traces and soldering to those points. Seemed to work better. I've cleaned up the nand significantly, and it seems to be reading as if it's not shorting anymore. I'm going to move on from this issue for now, and the backup wii has arrived so if later on I run into issues I will decide then whether to give fixing this another shot or if I will just start with the new wii.
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Just checked the resistances and they are measuring ok (120 for 1V, 8.7k for 3.3V, 50 for 1.15 on a RVK-CPU-01) so I moved on, did U10 relocation (except the pins came off so had to use u9) and then during LDO removal with hot air this happened.
What went wrong during hot air removal? How can I avoid this in the future. Also is the board at all useable or completely trash at this point?
Also, the C3 came off slightly, is that a problem as well?
Best
What went wrong during hot air removal? How can I avoid this in the future. Also is the board at all useable or completely trash at this point?
Also, the C3 came off slightly, is that a problem as well?
Best
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On the one hand, the board is literally giving me the finger, not sure what's it doing with the other hand but it can't be good.
Sheeeeesh, I don't think I've ever seen a fill ripped off like that before... Personally I'd trash it cause it might just not even be worth the effort trying to fix when Wiis are as cheap as they are. Others might be able to know for sure if its garbo or not?
Anyway, what happened here is that you were likely levering up on the part when the part and/or board was still cold. You should not have to apply any amount of force at all in order for that chip to come off cleanly, should just be able to be lifted off with a pair of tweezers once all the solder on all joints is melted. It can take a while because ground and voltage fills can wick away a lot of your heat, this is why it helps to preheat the board beforehand
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Thanks for clarifying. I was applying a lot of 400C heat and the C3 chip came loose, so I wanted to pry it off before it damaged anything else.
Something I found helps is to over-tin the pads with leaded solder before hot airing, including the big foot. Lowers the melting point and in my anecdotal experience, makes it a bit easier to remove. Also you should be cycling the air blast from the back to the front to heat it evenly, but don't use max airflow. I use 6 of 10 on mine, any higher flow rate reduces the effective air temp.
That pad rip is really just cosmetic if you were removing it for use with a PMS2. You've just lost a bit of copper, and can still supply 1.8v to the tantalum cap's positive end.
Since moving to the flood technique, no more issues
That pad rip is really just cosmetic if you were removing it for use with a PMS2. You've just lost a bit of copper, and can still supply 1.8v to the tantalum cap's positive end.
I've almost done this before
Since moving to the flood technique, no more issues
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IMO it's really not needed to use hot air on the LDO if you have an iron with decent thermal transfer. Just use a fat tip, load a ton of solder onto all of the legs and the foot, set your iron to about 700F / 375C, and rock the iron back and forth on the foot til it's ready to go (and keep the legs molten as well). It's worked 100% of the time in my experience.
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I am using the PMS-2 for this, so should I just carry on with the build as is, or do I need to do any recovery of the board to make it usable?
For the next trim I will definitely not use the hot air station, but the guide recommends using a dremel and that seemed like a more work and riskier, especially when many places on the forum mention using a hot air station for LDO removal.
For the next trim I will definitely not use the hot air station, but the guide recommends using a dremel and that seemed like a more work and riskier, especially when many places on the forum mention using a hot air station for LDO removal.
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The trim is fine, just wire your 1v8 line directly to the cap. I don't even bother to dremel down the LDO before desoldering, it just speeds up the process a bit
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How necessary are the capacitors at the base of the board? I've noticed quite a few trims remove them.
You can remove them without worry, will give you extra vertical clearance in that area as well so its usually recommended to remove them.
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I've modded and trimmed a new wii. Would anyone mind checking my work and letting me know if this trim will work? During sanding of the last one, I sanded through another NAND trace. It's going in the pile for later, I want to start with a better foundation for my first portable.
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It's not bad. You cut a bit close on the nand pins face tho. You'll have to be careful when sanding that side so as not to destroy the little ceramic capacitor
Also why'd you cut out that notch by the CPU?
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Dremel got away from me D:
I seemed to sand away a lot last time around. How do you tell when the board has actually been sanded enough?
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You can measure the resistance between the various voltage rails to determine if there's an indication of any shorts between them.
Details here.
Use the compendium / trimming guide to find some places for each voltage rail. I added to the manual site an image of several but is missing 1.8v - I should update that image....