Blew my T430s's keyboard backlight fuse, need help

[matthew28845]

I made a stupid mistake today. I tried installing the keyboard from my T500 onto my T430s just for fun. And it worked! But when I put back the keyboard from the T430s, the keyboard backlight no longer worked. The keyboard works just fine including the other lights on it, but the backlight doesn't. From what I've read, it looks like I blew some fuse on the motherboard and I'll have to either short the fuse and be careful or buy a new one. Where is the fuse I need to change and which one is it?

[matthew28845]

So I went along and figured this out myself, and I'll post the procedure here if anyone else has done this.

I used Lenovo's hardware maintenance manual as a disassembly guide. The 2 problems I noticed with it were that there's an extra screw for the fingerprint scanner for the palmrest, because my computer doesn't have the fingerprint scanner mine was missing this screw completely. Also, you don't need to completely remove the cable for the wireless switch board, just unplug the connector that goes to the motherboard.

The fuse that blew was F28, which is a really small fuse by the ultrabay SATA connector. It's labeled on the board, so it's pretty easy to find. I got a small amount of solder onto the tip of my soldering iron, then I just brushed over the fuse a few times until it was covered in solder. I then tested continuity once again to make sure it now made contact, and it did. Everything went back together pretty easily and I'm happy to report that my laptop is now re-assembled and fully functional with the keyboard backlight now working as well! If anyone has any questions about this procedure please feel free to ask.

[Thinkpad4by3]

You really should replace the fuse, not bridge it. It is fused for a reason. If you feel like carrying around fire hazard of a machine...be my guest, but don't say I didn't warn you. Li-ion batteries really don't like it when you short them out...and neither do thin PCB traces.

[matthew28845]

You really should replace the fuse, not bridge it. It is fused for a reason. If you feel like carrying around fire hazard of a machine...be my guest, but don't say I didn't warn you. Li-ion batteries really don't like it when you short them out...and neither do thin PCB traces.

I'm not skilled enough to replace the fuse, and even if I did there would be no point because I'm only gonna be using the keyboard which is currently in the machine from now on and it's an official Lenovo keyboard so it's unlikely that it'll short out.

[axur-delmeria]

I'm not skilled enough to replace the fuse, and even if I did there would be no point because I'm only gonna be using the keyboard which is currently in the machine from now on and it's an official Lenovo keyboard so it's unlikely that it'll short out.

You don't need to remove the old fuse. You can put the new fuse on top of the old one, then solder it in place.