leaf broke, change switch

nebiki · 26 May 2011, 22:32

hey, today one of my cherry switch's leaves broke and i'm thinking about swapping the whole switch with one from another board. do you have any experience with swapping switches and is it easy to do? it looks like there's 4 soldering joints for each base. i'm thinking about having my brother do the soldering, because i've never done it before. i've already told him to bring the necessary tools on sunday. does he have to know anything or is it simple desoldering/resoldering which anyone (except me maybe) can do? after the soldering joints have been removed, how do you disassemble the switch from the board without damaging anything?

sixty · 26 May 2011, 22:52

Once you have the switch desoldered you can just pop it off (assuming PCB mounted switch). If there is a metal plate you might have to apply some pressure from the bottom of the PCB. You should see a black plastic piece between the solder points. Apply pressure there with your thumb and it will pop out.

ripster · 27 May 2011, 01:36

The jumpers are a pisser. Tell him to bring good braid or a better solder pump than I have.

Findecanor · 27 May 2011, 12:11

Use a 15W soldering iron. A 30W iron could damage the board (as it did mine). More power is not better.

ripster · 27 May 2011, 16:23

At OCN they stick their graphics cards in ovens and on frying pans.

They do weird stuff at OCN.

nebiki · 27 May 2011, 18:22

alright, thanks for the answers. gonna forward them to my brother on sunday then. i hope we won't have to desolder more than one switch. i'm not sure if he has more than one soldering iron, though.

nebiki · 30 May 2011, 17:59

we broke the board. the keys work, but nkro is broken. w, n and 7 was swapped, they work together, but not w+e, n+m, 7+8 etc. funny thing is, when i try to push down q+e+r+t+w, the keyboard freezes. any ideas? well, i guess it's just broken.

Ascaii · 01 Jun 2011, 13:06

hmm...did you make sure to use the same bottom? make sure the switches match! Some switches have diodes, some a wire, some nothing. If the switch you soldered in is empty, but the board uses diode switches, its no wonder it wont work.

nebiki · 01 Jun 2011, 17:49

oh my god, you're right. they look different. so my board isn't broken? i just have to get some switches which match? none of my boards have these switches, though :/

Wibox · 03 Jun 2011, 16:05

Hey nebiki, how are the switches different? Just the diodes? I have some spare I can send you if that's what you need.

Here's a picture of them. I can desolder them off for you and send them over if you'll pay the postage. Let me know.