Birmingham or midlands based solderer. PLEASE HELP!

Hey guys, new to the board, but not a newcomer to the modding/hacking computer scene.

Im not terrible at soldering so i undertook the task of getting bluetooth internal on my aspire one. I have successfully soldered the +5v and the ground to the board. But when it came to the + and - signal lines on the PCIe mini port i cocked up. I shorted out a few of the terminals when my wife made me jump (cheers love) Iv tried to clean it up as much as i can but i dont wanna do anymore damage. Is there ANYONE who has the equipment and skill to help me out? I dont mind driving a fair distance to do this and a fee can obviously be arranged. A few quid to get my AAO up and running, and possibly have BT internal outway the near £200 i spent on the thing to have a door stop.

PM me if you think or upto it and i'll get back to you asap.

Sean

 

why dont you use CN11? type CN11 on the search bar of this forum and you should find a topic called "usb on mainboard" or something..

basically, because the mini pci-e connectors are **** small, you can use CN11 which is on the motherboard and is a free usb solder port complete with +5V, GND, D+, D-

let me know if you cant find it

p.s: does your wifi card work normally?

 

I'll definatly look into that cn11 thing and get that sorted. sounds alot easier. i have shorted out some of the pins on the wifi card slot so i am not plugging battery in or turning it on incase i blow something up. I'll get the solder sucker on it later, forgot i had one. If i can clear the excess solder and still leave the contacts in place i'll fire it up and see how it goes. hopefully i havent put too much heat in the area and caused any damage to corresponding components. I dunno whats in that area underneath. Fingers crossed!!! Gonna google CN11 now and see what it returns, i cant believe that tnkgrl wouldnt just use that instead of using the mini pcie. wish me luck!!!

 

My advice would be to get some desolder braid, it's a lot more effective than a solder sucker when working on PCB's

 

IIRC, tnkgirl's initial PCI-e USB hack somewhat predates the CN11 discovery.

 

If you're gona use the solder sucker thing, make sure to first put a blob of solder over the shorted area and then suck the blob away. It's really hard to just suck a tiny bit of solder.

 

Put the blob down and sucked it up as suggested. Cleared all the pads of solder. Next hurdle and this one is a b17ch. The blob managed to wick its way a little under the pcie connector. So i have a very fine line joining abuot 5 of the pins under the connector. didnt see this at first and tried to fire it up... green light for about 2 seconds then they go off. So obviously the short isnt appreciated by the systenm and it shuts itself off. Hopefully no damage done. Am going to buy a copper braid wick to get the remainder away (hopefully) Offer is still there to pay anyone who is near by to fix for me. Cheers

 

so wait, the pc is 'back to normal' i.e without the touchscreen controller, you add the wifi card, and it shuts itself off?

wow crap, i totally fucked up my mini pci-e card, its got solder all over it from what i remember but its been fine for a week so far now

edit: reason why im saying this is not to rub it in your face lol sorry, but some pple had the pc turn off on them when they had only connected the controller to CN11 without it being fully connected to the touchscreen..

 

Well, I'm no where near you but why not use a Stanley knife to break the joints ?

 

Cant cut it with a stanley knife, i'll end up chopping the actual contacts and stopping it working all together. I didnt plug the wifi card in for it not to turn on. I turned the netbook on without the wifi card installed and it turned itself off. Im shorting out 6 pins under the pcie connector. Only turned it on once so im probably safe from any permanent damage hopefully. I'll have a look at it again in a minute to see if i can break some of the shorts.

Btw... nowhere in this post did i mention touch screen lol

 

sorry lol, i saw the bluetooth thing after..i see soldering, i immediately jumped to touchscreen..what do you mean under the pcie connector?

 

Under the PCIE connector means the solder is under the connectors. LOL

 

i mean did he try to solder the connections on the other side of the motherboard, litterally under the pci-e connector..

 

Not on the opposite side of the pcie on the board. The solder is actually underneath the pcie slot. There is a really thin gap under the connector. probably about .5mm. The solder has flowed under the connector a little bit. Iv purchased some copper braid wick. hopefully that will clear this whole thing up. THen i can put my mini bt module back together and jus plug it in standard lol

 

i stilll think you should try cn11 i'll find the pick and post it for you

 

its all well and good doing the cn11 mod, which i probably will end up doing. But i still need to clear the pcie otherwise it wont even turn on lol.

 

good point, lol rushed it a little there lol.

 

Wick is taking ages to get here. Havent even go a delivery notification yet. I hope it works as well as it says on the tin lol.

 

Wick can be a useful tool (sometimes), but it's not really useful thing for your current problem unless. You'll need to melt the solder first, then melt the resin on the braid, then make contact between the braid and the solder. Only then, will desoldering braid work.

BTW, i use desoldering wick to solder instead of desoldering.
For those thiny connections, I tend to put a blob over all the connections (i know i'm shorting it out), then put the wick over it. Magically, all of those "small feets" on smt unit are perfectly soldered.

 

so the wick makes the solder go to the connections and kinda automatically seperates each pin and leaves no solder on the chipboard?