VOGONS


First post, by appiah4

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I bought a small bundle from a seller. There was an unimportant ISA VGA in the lot that I knew was repairably damaged (loose resistor needed resoldering). Apparently the seller decided to test the whole bunch out of goodwill. To my surprise they all work (screenshots and videos were sent to confirm), and a mystery CPU I got on a board turned out to be a Cx5x86-100 (Yay me?). But he went the extra mile and fixed the ISA VGA card as well.

With superglue.

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He swears it works (and sent video to confirm) but I would of course like to remove the superglue and solder it back down properly.

How do I remove the cyanoacrylate without damaging the card?

Retronautics: A digital gallery of my retro computers, hardware and projects.

Reply 1 of 16, by pentiumspeed

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Best way is hot air heat around 300C-350C will melt and vaporize that type, use flux as well. I had one happen to me at our cellphone repair and had to "melt that glue out" of the LCD screen's spring clip (mounted to the frame's but removed trying to scrape glue out by a tech with no success till I tried heat to help out,) for iphone. Don't ask me why, it was like that when came in for repair, some guy who tried to fix themselves botched it up.

Cheers,

Great Northern aka Canada.

Reply 2 of 16, by Tiido

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I haven't had any good results heating superglue, plus the fumes that come off are incredibly harsh and you definitely need a face mask to prevent inhalation and any getting in your eyes. I have just mechanically displaced the glue when it gets in the way. It won't bond to the PCB and metal so it should come off pretty easily.

T-04YBSC, a new YMF71x based sound card & Official VOGONS thread about it
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mida sa loed ? nagunii aru ei saa 😜

Reply 3 of 16, by beastlike

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Acetone is typically what I go for to remove superglue residue from my items (and my fingers). I've never had it damage a surface, but I don't know what acetone, or the mixture of dissolved superglue and acetone would do to the surrounding components.

Reply 4 of 16, by maxtherabbit

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beastlike wrote on 2020-01-20, 23:42:

Acetone is typically what I go for to remove superglue residue from my items (and my fingers). I've never had it damage a surface, but I don't know what acetone, or the mixture of dissolved superglue and acetone would do to the surrounding components.

Acetone is a great and powerful solvent. So much so, I'd be afraid it would dissolve the solder resist

Reply 5 of 16, by Tiido

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Acetone has no effect on almost any electronic part (only outer sleeves of e-caps and various other soft plastics) or PCBs, the soldermask is completely immune to it.

T-04YBSC, a new YMF71x based sound card & Official VOGONS thread about it
Newly made 4MB 60ns 30pin SIMMs ~
mida sa loed ? nagunii aru ei saa 😜

Reply 7 of 16, by krcroft

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Acetone (aka nail polish remover) can do a number on many plastics!

I had one of those thin, very hard dental night-guard/grind retainers, which I left on the counter, and I accidentally knocked over my wife's nail polish remover. Although I wiped up the general spill, I didn't bother doing a detailed job (thinking it would evaporate on its own).

Well, my assumption about evaporation didn't matter because within hours the stuff had liquified the bottom portion of my night guards (finally a permanent reason not to wear them) 😀

Reply 8 of 16, by Horun

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appiah4 wrote on 2020-01-21, 05:23:

Acetone it is then.. How about IPA though? Or lemon cologne?

Do not think IPA will cut it. Lemon cologne ? hahaa might make it smell fruity but doubt it will clean it.
Just don't get acetone on the IC's, should not hurt the coated epoxy board or any traces.

Hate posting a reply and then have to edit it because it made no sense 😁 First computer was an IBM 3270 workstation with CGA monitor. https://archive.org/details/@horun

Reply 9 of 16, by kaputnik

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To effectively dissolve cyanoacrylate, you'd need some chlorinated hydrocarbon, and those are hard to come by nowadays. In most civilized countries, you need some kind of license to buy them, they're not very healthy. There are special cyanoacrylate solvents too, but got no idea how PCB laminate, solder mask, and electronic components react to them. Acetone can have some limited ability to dissolve hardened cyanoacrylate, but is far from effective.

I'd simply use a combination of heat to weaken the bond and mechanical removal in your case. Just take your time, and all should be fine.

IPA and other relatively polar solvents won't work at all.

Are you absolutely sure it's cyanoacrylate btw? It would really be an odd choice for that application. Epoxy would be far more likely in my opinion.

Reply 10 of 16, by appiah4

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It is indeed cyanoacrylate. The seller is an ignorant (no offense) scrapper, he just used what was conveniently available.

Although ideally I would like to, I dont have to remove all the CA On the PCB (it is not polar and therefore not conductive right?); hopefully there isnt much on the underside so I can just mechanically clear it and apply some solder. The card works as is. Just CA isnt a great thing to fix cold solder joints 😁

Retronautics: A digital gallery of my retro computers, hardware and projects.

Reply 12 of 16, by appiah4

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The Serpent Rider wrote on 2020-01-21, 09:33:

I would leave it like that. The card not worth it.

Ok. To you maybe. I think its a fun restoration. The card is useful in 286 and 8-bit PCs for me.

Last edited by appiah4 on 2020-01-21, 09:55. Edited 1 time in total.

Retronautics: A digital gallery of my retro computers, hardware and projects.

Reply 13 of 16, by kaputnik

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appiah4 wrote on 2020-01-21, 08:50:

It is indeed cyanoacrylate. The seller is an ignorant (no offense) scrapper, he just used what was conveniently available.

Although ideally I would like to, I dont have to remove all the CA On the PCB (it is not polar and therefore not conductive right?); hopefully there isnt much on the underside so I can just mechanically clear it and apply some solder. The card works as is. Just CA isnt a great thing to fix cold solder joints 😁

Well, conductivity has nothing with polarity in that respect to do, rather with chemical bond types and how readily electrons can flow between nuclei, but no, hardened CA is not conductive 😀

Sounds like a sensible approach to the problem. Probably what I'd done too if removing all of it was too much of a hassle.

Reply 16 of 16, by yawetaG

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krcroft wrote on 2020-01-21, 05:57:

Acetone (aka nail polish remover) can do a number on many plastics!

Yes. It either dissolves them outright or damages them.

And it can cross the barrier that is called skin if left soaking long enough, so if you get it on your fingers, wash hands immediately with lots of water.