Thinkpads Forum

You all know common problem of loose screen lid, moving here and there because of additional ageing of hinges. Some say to replace them with new ones, some say to buy them cheap from e-bay, I SAY NO!

Since my girlfriend accidentally smashed screen on my T60 by dragging headphone cables of the table and while I'm waiting for proper LCD replacement I decided to take chance to fix loose hinges as long as I have whole lid assembly dismantled just lying there.

Sorry for little bit grainy photos but my cheap dumb phone is not capable of making better photos and I tried to fix it by Photoshop...

Things I used: Normal pliers to check the tolerance play, clipper knife, soda can, scissors, fingers and hands plus brain...

The play is created by ageing of two parts industrially pressed together during manufacture. Since there is no way to dismantle them, I tried to slide in another piece of thin metal to the gap created by twisting parts.

http://fsxslovakia.szm.com/forum/Gapplay.jpg

To check and actually see the play you have to grab the main visible part of the hinge to the pliers, be careful no to press it too much creating unwanted scratches on the visible part. I did grab it by the part which is fixed by screws to the main frame of the laptop. It is crucial to place the pliers to the table because hand will not hold it without moving it. Then you can spot where is the gap and how big it is by moving the upper part which goes to the LCD...

After that I created half-cylinder shaped metal cut out from soda can because the aluminium thickness. To shape it like the hinge pin I moulded it around the hinge itself. Before inserting my new part I had to make sure that corners of it are nice and even. They need to slide in to the gap without bending itself.

http://fsxslovakia.szm.com/forum/metalpart.jpg

After preparation I just simply inserted the part into the gap:

http://fsxslovakia.szm.com/forum/partin.jpg

Flipping whole assembly upside down holding the upper part of the hinge I started slightly bang the whole part against desk by metal part causing it to slide into the gap:

http://fsxslovakia.szm.com/forum/inserting.jpg

It did slide in almost by 90% but the gap was probably tighter close to the bottom so the metal part could not slide in more and remaining part had to be cut away by knife:

http://fsxslovakia.szm.com/forum/cutaway.jpg

To check I put the hinge to the pliers and hold it against desk to check possible play. On second hinge I had to slide in two metal shapes to get it right. Maybe you'll need to press the outer part little bit to make it more tight.

I hope this small guide will help you guys to get your T60 back to the manufactured state, unfortunately I'm still looking around the web for right screen display to put all things back together.

PS: Sorry for my grammar I'm not English...

Forum rules require a warning in the post-title that there are pictures in it (like "Loose hinges - my solution *PICS*").
Forum rules also require only ONE SMALL picture (no more than ~50KB), except in the pictures-forum!
So please replace these huge pictures by just LINKS to them.

Apart from it all, I have NEVER seen a T60 with worn hinges, and I have had a few hundred of them going through my hands!

I hope it is all right now.

I have my IBM T60 (production date 2006) with loose hinges that I needed to fix so I just wanted to share my solution.
By loose hinges I mean that when it is open and you touch the lid it goes loosely before you can experience resistance of the hinge itself, hope it clarifies...

Very nice solution! Is there any way you can make a video of it?

I've been through a three T61p's, a W500, a T60, and all of these has got alot of play in the hinges.

Unfortunatelly I had only one set of hinges available and it is quite difficult to pull the metal parts which I slided in out again. It is bassically one way process to get it in.

In fact it is straight and simple process. I would say that holding those hinges in pliers against table can really show you where is that gap created. That's how I figured out that something suitable has to go into the gap to stop this wobbling of my screen lid.

What part of the process is making you troubles?

Nice solution! Thanks for sharing. I have one question tough. Could it be, that this method could create more problems than it solves? Lets say you fixed hinges by this method, however they might become too tight, so in time they could break a roll cage of your T61 which is way bigger problem than loose hinges. In my experience as a computer technician, often case/hinge breakage is caused by hinges becoming too tight. There are many types of hinge used in laptops, some are designed to let you adjust the force if needed, some are using far more simple mechanics and they either become looser or tighter during exploitation.

So I'm just curious if your hinges, after this modification became more tight or +/- remained the same? I mean, clearly, you have fixed the wobbling play in the hinge, but it is important to note, if overall tightness were affected?

Hello,

After applying my solution there is still some play in game. I'm still looking for screen replacement so it is still in dismantled state. To compare things the play is however much much smaller that it was before. To make it super tight I would have to stick in more and more metal sheets. There is also grease already in. The resistance is bigger, that has to be mentioned but I never ever had a chance to come across of brand new hinges on T60 so I cannot compare it. I was inspired by Lenovo SL500, just grabbed lid and noticed there is almost no play, but SL500 is far more younger and it was bought as brand new laptop and it is not heavily used.

I would not be worried about too much of a resistance, there will be definitely some play remaining because physically there is limit of how much sheets can you actually slide in.

Hope it helps...

Thanks for the suggestion. I have a friend with loose hinges on their T60 14" that we got her. I asked her what she did since I've never seen a Thinkpads hinges do that. Now I know that it does happen to others and will probably just do shims also.

Cheers,
Steve