X61T - Repair of a Broken Hinge; Spring of the Latch Release

[loyukfai]

In reference to a previous post, I've finally replaced the hinge.

The left neck of the original hinge (FRU 42W2545) has completely broken off, and the new one's (FRU 42W3477) looks sturdier exactly at that place.

The process has been well documented (see below links) so I didn't take much photos, but two, of the broken hinge are included below.

As a sidenote, I've destroyed the screw holes on the front palm rest when taking apart the machine, guess I put too much blue loctite on the screws last time.

Also, the front bezel was quite difficult to pull off because of the adhesive tapes.

Now I may need to find a replacement front bezel and a hinge cover, and I have another question - Is the spring of the latch release also included in the front palm rest...? Cause mine is lost (another story)...

Cheers.

P.S. Another point(s) scored for the ThinkPads - The availability of parts, vivid communities here and at lenovo.com, lots of information on the Internet, and the fact that the machine held up pretty well for the abuse I exacted on it during my travel.

References:
http://www.lenovoservicetraining.com/io ... index.html
http://techgrrl.wordpress.com/2010/08/2 ... 61-tablet/
http://vimeo.com/22297875

[markup]

To the OP: I'm pretty sure the spring is part of the palmrest. If you are still here and still need to know, I can pull the palmrest from my x61t to confirm this. Lemme know.

I'm continuing this thread since I finally replaced the hinge on my x60t, which is very similar to the x61t. The left side of the hinge broke shortly after a hard impact. The right side held on doing double duty for about 4 months before it also broke.

Some notes for anyone else who has this issue:

1) Replace the hinge as soon as possible. When one of the sides breaks, it leaves a twisted jagged piece of metal that could damage your video/wacom/touchscreen/mic/fingerprint/button/LED/wifi/wlan cables. Wow. That's a lot of stuff wired through that hinge.

2) Use a good screwdriver. This job removes and replaces about 40 screws, and some of them (esp in the LED bezel) might be tough. I used Wiha PH0 and PH1 drivers, but either of those should work for all screws.

3) Take photos. A decent cellphone camera will do the job. Photos will let you see exactly where you have to replace the wires and different-sized screws. You can also take photos of any labels inside, so if something fails in the future, you don't have to take it apart to find the part/FRU #.

4) Be very very careful with the keyboard bezel on the x60t. In particular, the thin plastic rail over the SD card slot, and the thin magnesium rail over the hard drive, are very delicate. Keep a fresh tube of superglue/cyanoacrylate handy in case of breaks.

5) I bought a used replacement hinge on ebay from a company in Atlanta, for $20. Just looked and they still have more. You can also buy "new" hinges from Hong Kong vendors for about $50, but if you live in the US, shipping takes longer and returns may be impossible. The hinge I received is rock-solid in the open-close direction, and 1-2mm of play in the pivot (swivel and lateral wobble). Not perfect, but good enough for a backup laptop.

6) The left & right hinges (open-close direction) are non-adjustable. The pivoting hinge has 2 screws underneath that I'm guessing would change the tightness. However, they are glued in place. If you want to play with them you'll have to break the glue first, perhaps by applying a hot soldering iron to the screws.

7) The "Hardware Maintenance Manual" for the X60 and X61 tablets is all I used as a reference. It doesn't show the display daughterboard that obviously has to be removed (maybe that is only on my "multitouch" x60t?). However it DOES show you everything else, including how you should pull the keyboard bezel and LCD bezel to remove them with (hopefully) no damage.

Hope this helps.

[Raceboy]

One can tighten the left-right movement by taking apart the spring washers in the hinge rotating mechanism and swap the sides: take upper and place it lower and vice versa. It makes the hinge tight as new. Prior to that one should check that the two screws are tightened, they are often loose and that would make it seem like the hinge is worn.
I did it on my wifes X60T and it is like new after that.

[loyukfai]

Umm... No need to do it intentionally, but in case you happen to open the chassis, please do take a look. Thx.

Regarding the broken palmrest, I've decided to stay put at the moment. It is bothering but... Anyway I'm trying to keep my expenditure low these days.

The advice and points are well taken. Especially for pt.1 - The cable on mine also began to tear, presumably by the cuts. Approximately 2 months had past between the time the hinge broke and replaced.

The daughterboard is also there on my non-multitouch model.

Cheers.