I've always done that, and still, my old laptop got shorted out from a bad power unit and I had to buy a new power circuit because I couldn't fix it.

its easy to open a copy charger

I hated opening them so much (to the exasperation of saying "nice words" in my native language) that I had to buy a dremel. Thank you very much for the tip. All the best.

@@carlosgarciaoropeza5480 people here keep saying they use a Dremel but high speed tools don't cut plastic too well. They just melt it. Most of those plastic cases you can open by just squeezing them in a vise. The plastic weld cracks then. If I can't get the case to just split apart as a last resort I'll use a hacksaw to cut it on the seam. Once I get a nice slot going I can get a little pry bar in there and get it to bust open then.

@@1pcfred Dremel SC476 SpeedClic

@@carlosgarciaoropeza5480 rotary tools really don't like running slowly. The cooling fan in them doesn't work so well when they don't turn at high speed. I blew a Dremel up once cutting plastic with it. It overheated and the magnet in it split. Damned thing flew out of my hand when it let go. It's really not easy to design variable speed electric motors.

Ebay at half price.

Laptop voltages are fairly universal (18-21 volts/4-5 amps) even if the end connectors are not

@@MikinessAnalog yes all my latops operate at 19 volts and i have like 4 of em

Save them as power supply for various projects, I use 2 to power my 2 iMax B6 chargers, and converted one with a step down converter to charge batteries.

Did that last week, half an hour after unplugginga board to the mains I thought it was discharged, and zap. Then I checked, still had 120v.

so is the charger 3 phased, capacitor getting 400v from 2 phase. or is there a boost converter inside charger? how does it get to 400v if main supply, 1phase is 230v?

@@TomiBorchert multiply it by square root of 2. the most distant points of the sine wave. so the cap will be charged to this voltage after rectifier. cca 325V DC!

At my high school - a vocational technical school - it was a popular prank to charge a capacitor to a hundred volts or so and toss it to someone to catch. I learned from others' experience and refused the offer to catch anything. :)

@Tomi Borchert 230-240vac is the RMS voltage, not the peak voltage. Plus, the capacitor voltage needs to be rated higher than the applied normal working voltage. There will be a safety margin.

@@omarhamani2126 In the same way as to remove the battery stuck in a smartphone? I must try! thank you ! Nice !

One way is to use a vice and clamp it into the vise just below the seam and tighten. You should hear the glue crack as you squeeze it. If it fails to crack open, flip it upside down and re clamp it in the vise and tighten. It should crack. You have to understand that the case is designed where there is a reduced thickness section that fits into the other half. Squeezing the right half causes it to compress inwards ungluing the joint. If compressed from the wrong side you are forcing the two halves together. A thin steel putty knife also helps once you have split the case lengthwise. Ungluing the short ends is a bit harder. If you can see which half fits into the other half, use the putty knife to carefully force down into the end joints. Cheap aftermarket supplies are easier to open than the authentic supplies. Use care, if you slip you can get a nasty cut on your hands and or fingers.

We use a Dremel

I crack the cases open by squeezing them in a vise.

When an enclosure can't be pried apart, I've sometimes been able to open the seams using a very sharp chisel and careful application of moderate hammer blows. It depends on the customer - if they are satisfied with functional but ugly it makes things much easier. Just crack it open any old way and tape it up when done. Some customers will be happier with a more expensive replacement unit than they are with a cheaper but more obvious repair. Knowing how to repair things is sometimes less important than understanding customer expectations. Actually, way more than "sometimes".

@@Thankz4sharing I've done the chisel on the seam thing myself. Sawing can work too. If you're very careful. Usually they just split on the seam. The ultrasonically welded ones split apart. Some are tough though.

@@1pcfred Good point. A fine tooth bow saw is handy. Probably a good idea to wear a mask. Some of that plastic dust is nasty.

He also could clean this PCB ...

Right! Some hot glue does wonders in order to get the output cables steady and free from separating from the charger ♥

@6:09 you can already see a faint ring around the third pin as it is starting to fail also

Or tell the user to reboot the system 🤣

Probably the battery gone if it still powers up using the charger

Some open easily some are more stubborn. You have to have the tools to do it. The main tool is a bench vise. That alone will open most. The ones that don't just crack open you have to get more aggressive with. I find that attacking a corner with a screwdriver usually does it. But it if doesn't then I'll hammer and chisel the seam. Just walk along the seam with the corner of the chisel.

He uses nothing but colophonia - pine rosin with terpenes boiled -out. Notice how it looks like Baltic amber? It's hard. Then the soldering iron melts it, it is transferred to solder joint on the tip and cools and forms a shellac - like glass - like Ph balanced neutral protective shell. If it doesn't harden or if it turned black - it must be washed away, yes. Improper heat causes this. Black colophonia IS now caustic. But when done right: that protective glass shell protects the area from liquid damage, oxidization, etc. Sorin has one of our community's greatest videos - of truly great value - where he shares with us how to make our own liquid soldering flux.

@@skeggjoldgunnr3167 I know it is "just the resin", but believe me, it is highly hygroscopic and tends to form conductive paths. When still dry, it appears to be perfectly OK. But once it absorbs some moisture (it takes time, but it really does), it upsets high impedance circuits, but really does tend to form carbonized filaments when exposed to high voltage, resulting to nasty flashovers. It does not happen immediately after such repair, the problems start after a year or so when sometimes exposed to humidity (temperature changes are enough; the humidity has to diffuse towards the conductors, so it takes time after exposure as well)...

@@annaplojharova1400 So in high voltage, high impedance circuits I should take care! Thanks for further enlightening me! It makes sense., assuming it is so prone to absorb this moisture. Thanks for adding your expertise.

@@skeggjoldgunnr3167 The best practice is to automatically clean it after your work is done. First the "high impedance circuits" are present way more often than you would expect (e.g. crystal connection to a microcontroller is a high impedance circuit - biasing tends to use 10meg+ resistances, a feedback divider around an opamp or regulator usually is another one, where it tend to shift voltages or introduce quite a lot of noise). Second aspect is, it block the view on the joint, so cleaning it allows you to inspect your work, whether it is really soldered as it should be. But with cleaning you should be careful the dissolved flux residue does not contaminate connectors, sockets, switches or so. What works for me is scrape the bulk of it mechanically and only the rest clean out using a solvent (IPA,...) and a small brush or "earbud", so the washed off mess does not end up somewhere without my control.

@@annaplojharova1400 I used to use a freon vapor machine The vapors would rise as a gas onto board, drop to under flash point, turn back to liquid state and precipitate back down - it did perfect work. Then I am told that this process was found by the state of California to be too effective and you're racist if you use that method now. So now I use Acetone bath with acid brush then rinse in 50/50 Perchloroethylene / N-Hexane. And what do you MEAN, insinuating that my soldering isn't perfect every time the first time?! Why, I NEVER! 😜 Cool info! Thanks. Will add that to making today a much better day, for having learned something! My MIT / US Navy electronics instructor back in the 1970's said "A day that you earn money is a good day. A day that you LEARN something is a GREAT day!"

You squeeze the case in a vise. You squeeze it until you hear a crack. But don't squeeze so tight you're squeezing what's inside the case. If you don't get the crack flip the case in the vise and squeeze the other side. If that doesn't work then you have to squeeze longways. If that doesn't work then you have to hammer a screwdriver into a corner and twist. If that doesn't work then you have to chisel the seam. If chiseling the seam doesn't work then you have to break out a hacksaw.

Actually for me he has soldered the middle and left pin, look at the tracks 03:32. The right one solder seems good.

It's a bless...and a curse :))

Maybe pop it open with flat screwdriver, some marks are visible.

with a knife and hammer. it's not a joke :). that's how I open them.

@@DarkGT i used screwdrivers before but yeah they are destructive lol.

@@Adrian_Buligadoes the knife needs to be sharp or not? how long is the knife should be?

@@Sht97 Sorin used a electrical tape, it's destroyed in some ways. You can cut it clean with a saw or try to pop it with something flat and thin. You can heat a knife red-hot and make your task easy.

i open it by (relatively) gently hammering a blade of knife (small camping knife) the slot / middle part (juste aviod the corner, you will break it). I guess there is a better solution

Place the adapter on its side and place a (butter) knife blade on the seam. Whack it with a rubber mallet harder and harder until it splits. Once you've cracked it open, you can use a spudger or even a large screwdriver to crack the rest of it. Use superglue or zip-ties to close it back up when you're done.

How to open it? Very good trick is to apply petrol(gasoline) or diesel using syringe. Put small amount in that hole-lines around the charger (it will spread out automatically by itself) and then wait 2-3minutes. Then you will open it very easily by hand. (when you play with petrol/diesel - remember to open the window to provide fresh air).

Thank you for sharing! I'll try

@@Radek__ I have tried this technique once with lighter fluid and it did not work. I may have to retry using "real" gasoline, thank you.

Yeah, there was visible "rounded hollow" around the third pin also... Everytime I do all 3 pins even some of them look OK.

cu un cutit si ciocan merge cel mai bine....dupa parerea mea. le iei pe mijlic la ciocanit si se deslipesc. niste rabdare si gata. :)

Usually a flat headed screwdriver and light hits with a hammer or even any other lightweight tool.

The ez way is stick a screwdriver across the terminals, the safe way is to clip a bleed resistor across it

A lot of times you can split the case open cleanly by squeezing it in a vise. Put the split line right on top of the jaw. Then squeeze down. It if doesn't open then flip the case in the vise and squeeze the other half. Sometimes you have to rotate the case 90° and squeeze that way too. But then you need a big vise that can open wide.