Removing and replacing Futaba MA switches

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Palatino

21 Jun 2021, 08:23

Hi,
Does anyone have any experience of removing and replacing Futaba MA/clicky switches? If I desolder a switch from the board, can I then just pull it up out of the plate, and then pop a fresh one down into the plate from above and solder that in? Or will the switches only come out of the plate downwards, meaning I have to desolder absolutely all of them to get the board out of the way? The "A" key only registers with a really hard press, whereas the other keys only need a light touch, so I want to swap in a good switch from a lesser-used key to the A position.
Many thanks.

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Bjerrk

21 Jun 2021, 08:29

It's the former. You can remove a single switch and replace it with a new one.

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Palatino

21 Jun 2021, 12:41

Great, thank you: that's good to hear. Have you done it yourself? Do they need a lot of force to come out or a squeeze in a particular direction?

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Bjerrk

21 Jun 2021, 13:25

Yeah, I have removed a few, but ultimately abandoned the project because the switches were in too bad condition. They were a bit of a hassle to get off, but this was mostly due to the pins being bent very firmly onto the PCB. Other than that it didn't seem to require any special methods.

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