5: And now do everything backwards

Now it was time to put the new caps back on. The first few where a bit wonky, but the connection was solid. I checked each one under the microscope to make sure it's soldered down properly. I'd like to say that my soldering got better towards the end but that would be a lie.

The same motherboard as before but now with some more parts of the caps removed.

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Next up where the caps where I ripped of the pads. On the first one the trace connected to the output board on one side and to a via on the other. The trace connected to the via disappeared under the display on the other side.

A photo of the screen of my microscope showing the ripped of pad where one of the capacitors was soldered to.

Another photo of the motherboard. This time on the front where a trace comes out from a via and directly disappears under the display. The trace is marked with a small arrow.

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I scraped off parts of the solder mask and used some magnet wire to reconnect the traces I broke. I did the same thing on both caps because I didn't trust the pad on the second cap that was just barely hanging on. I don' think I have to say that I haven't done this before very often but I'm doing it anyways.

Then I used some UV curing solder mask to fix the wires in place and some hot glue to hold the capacitors down. I'm normally not a fan of HotSnot? but I guess this is a good application for it.

A top down photo taken with the microscope. A capacitor is soldered down and there's a very thin copper wire connected to it, leading off screen.

Another microscope shot. Two thin copper wires are soldered to a trace which had the solder mask ontop of it removed. The soldering isn't exactly pretty.

Photo of the motherboard. Two capacitors are secured with two dabs of translucent-white hot glue each. There's also some dark green solder mask covering up the thin copper wires.

The front side of the PCB that also show some new solder mask.

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I then continued to but the remaining caps on. The location guide by Joe was a great help. And as promised my soldering didn't improve on bit.

A overview-photo of the whole PCB with all the new components soldered down.

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