Repairing printed circuit boards - tips by Exception PCB

PCBs, or printed circuit boards, have revolutionised the electronic industry; however they lack the robustness of the earlier, steel-chassis, hardwired equipment, driving them to be much easier to crack. Restoring a circuit board needs a particular level of analytical ability, along with the skill to handle each element in the correct way.

Without having a thorough knowledge of the way a circuit board works, experts from Exception PCB express that diagnosing the trouble will be a problem. For PCBs that are especially complex, you might also need an oscilloscope to discover signals at different points, so as to discover the section which is creating the problem. Once this component has been discovered, it will then have to be replaced. Here, Exception PCB provides you with a brief guide on how to do this.

As outlined by Exception PCB, with the majority of passive (and occasionally active) components, a similar, as opposed to an exact copy of the broken element can be used as a replacement. You will find, for example, several unique versions of voltage regulators available, and one version can easily be swapped for another in a PCB. However, broken active components that have a very specific function (for example, audio amplifier chips) must be replaced with an exact copy.

After you have acquired the right replacement, you'll have to place the PCB on a flat surface for the fix. Exception PCB says that you might use tape to stick the board on both sides to the surface, to ensure that it doesn't move whilst you are carrying out the replacement. Pull the damaged component off the board very delicately, using tweezers. Next, switch on your soldering iron and set it to about 400 degrees Celsius.

Take some copper wire and put it on the pads of the PCB where the component was, and use the soldering iron to heat it. Wonderful pcb that any surplus solder remaining on these pads could be absorbed by the copper. Get in line the leads of the replacement component with the board's pads, taking a look at to make sure that the element is aligned as it needs to be. Then, use the soldering iron and the solder to join the leads with the corresponding pads on the board.