Tweezers

Mi Problema

I bought my first apartment a few months ago, where I live with my girlfriend. It was built in 1969 and belonged to the same woman ever since. When we got home last night, there was no way to get the key inside the lock and make it turn. It was stuck. We have a 3-point lock, which is very secure.

We were locked outside our home, it was pretty late, and we had everything inside.

Mi Solucion

I don't know how it works in the USA, but in France, getting a locksmith to come to your place late costs approximately 50€, to which you have to add repair costs that can range from 100 to 1000€+, depending on how hard your problem is to resolve (depending on your face, in other terms). These people don't even look to simple solutions today. They make a hole in your door/lock and charge you the max fee. We took a look at the internet: a 787 Ficket lock costs around 600€, service excluded. Even though we're not poor, we are currently renovating our place and don't have so much money to spend like that.

We first ran to the nearest grocery store just before its closing time to grab some penetrating oil. Didn't work. Thanks to our neighbour's kindness, and after almost an hour trying and trying again, we did manage to open the door using one of her old radiography. But the matter was that as long as we couldn't insert the key from the outside, we would never both be able to get out of the apartment at the same time without replacing the lock.

I had a look inside of the lock, and the protective claws were open (they are closed on the attached picture, which is taken from the inside) and I could see many small springs inside of the lock. They were the ones preventing us from inserting the key. They are flagged "Axes de ressorts" and "cache-entrée de clé," literally "spring axis" and "claws." Totally broken and matted inside the mechanism. I took a look at exploded views of this lock on the internet and figured out that those springs were the ones closing the protective claws. The lock was 15-years-old, so I guess that it had come to its end.

I grabbed my pair of iFixit tweezers and gently grabbed and extracted the springs that you can see in the picture.

The claws don't close by themselves anymore when I remove the key, but at least everything else works fine now. Saved 1 to 2k€, smiling again.

Thank you internet, thank you iFixit!

Mi Consejo

If you've already tried, try again harder.

Think before you pay the highest price—the solution might be as easy as it was here.

Mi Problema

lightning cable port would't charge , only would charge with new Apple cables. thought it may have been from using crappy cheap cables for years

Mi Solucion

I purchased a used cable witch came well packaged and in a static free sealed bag. Followed the guide and it all went very well. Although the guide had called for removing the battery. I would have happily done so had I had replacement adhesive strips, but some other users suggested that it was possible without removing it. I took my chances and they were right it was possible. but it would have been a little easier with it removed.

Mi Consejo

if you have the adhesive strip, go ahead and remove the battery, it will make the job easier. And be patient reattaching the antenna cable, it will go but it taked a steady hand

Mi Problema

Battery needed replacing

Mi Solucion

Everything went well but I did have a small delay putting the screws (3) back into the battery connector cover(s). Just couldn't get the screws into the holes to line up. I removed the battery connector and reset it in its socket! Poofy that did it.

Mi Consejo

I layed down a fine small towel i order to catch any errant screws...they are tiny

Mi Problema

Battery was draining very quickly and the phone would shut off for no apparent reason.

Mi Solucion

Repair took longer than expected - the screws are so small making them difficult to both remove and replace. Also, the instructions on the battery glue were very confusing.

Mi Consejo

After one week of great phone and battery performance, results are trending down. The app I have on my phone to monitor battery performance after a week of "Excellent" is now showing "BAD".

My thought is that the phone must be infected and most likely time to replace.

Mi Problema

My iPhone 6 was just getting tired.... Battery life was short and the lightning connector was getting intermittent. Sometime, after supposedly charging overnight, I would (not) wake up to a dead phone. The normal removal of navel lint from the connector followed by cleaning with a little contact cleaner no longer worked. Since "to repair in noble and to replace is expensive," I had to go for it. It was a little scary since I am 71 with not too great eyesight and a less than a totally steady hand, but I had to give it a go!

Mi Solucion

I ordered my parts from iFixit and waited...and waited....and waited... Wups,!I forgot to press last "enter" button, thus no order! I "reordered" -- about $60 for parts, tools, and taxes -- and all showed showed up ASAP. Repair took about 4 hours, including about an hour struggling with the tinniest co-ax antenna connector I have ever encountered. (see below)

Phone worked immediately - good long battery life and totally reliable lightning connector. 100% success, I would say. Old guys rule!

Mi Consejo

The coaxial connector for antenna cable is extremely difficult to reconnect. It must be properly aligned with it's socket and quite a bit if pressure must be applied to get it to snap in. The alignment is done entirely by feel as one cannot see the receiving socket while the plug if over it.

It took me over an hour of trying to get the new connector to seat. I actually reconnected to old connector (attached to the broken assembly being replaced) several times, just to make sure I hadn't damaged the receiving socket. Although the old connector would reseat easily, new one fought me every step of the way.

This connector snaps together much like a clothing snap. I think the one supplied with the new assemble slightly different in size from the old one, perhaps made that way to assure a tight and permanent fit. One thing is certain - once seated the connector will not fall out.

One more piece of advice. Before you begin the phone disassembly, find a parts container with at least half dozen small bins. Keep the screws and parts associated with each disassembly step in a separate bin. If you make the mistake of mixing all these flea sized (but all slightly different) screws together, you will have a difficult time figuring out which screw to use in each situation.

Mi Problema

I broke the digitizer on my iPhone 6 and had been experiencing deteriorating battery performance for approximately 3 months prior to this event. So I figured if I was cracking it open, I might as well replace the battery too.

Mi Solucion

It went very well. The hardest part was that my old adhesive strips broke prior to proper removal of the battery. I ended up using a hair dryer and several older credit cards to work it out. It was not fun, and the old battery bent a lot, but I got it off with some patience.

Mi Consejo

1) It would be great to have some suggestions as to types of hard plastic cards we could use to pry out the battery. Credit cards were about the right size, but not rigid or thin enough to be truly helpful. To be honest, I thought the repair kit would have come with the stiff card shown in the replacement guide. I'd recommend you either include the stiff card as part of the repair kit or make it more visible on the purchasing screen that this card would be helpful.

2) I bent the old battery a lot. Given the warnings that were provided in the replacement guide, I was very worried that I was doing something wrong. I would have appreciated some guidance or

3) When replacing the adhesive strips, it was not readily apparent that the black strip between the small end that goes on top and the larger bottom part needs to go over the side of the battery. If I was regularly doing this, I would have figured it out implicitly, but as this was my first repair, I almost had to start over for missing this detail. Making that more obvious would have saved me some heartache.

4) The adhesive replacement guide implicitly assumes that second bullet of Step 8 is assumed. Having a picture with a call-out or a highlight would have been helpful.

Mi Problema

My display had a vertical line in the center

Mi Solucion

The repair went smoothly

Mi Consejo

Follow the manual, Take your time removing the connectors, sort the removed screws into containers, and have some good tape on hand to reinstall the labels and heat sink covers. Also use something to protect the new display when you unfold its hinges, I used an old credit card.

Mi Problema

My battery charge would drop quickly, and I went from one charge every two days to two charges each day without significant change in my usage. Moreover, my battery charge was frequently "lying" to me, suggesting there was more than there was or dropping quickly to 20% and staying there for longer than was accurate, so I couldn't trust the information. Multiple times, when the phone would shut itself off, I wasn't able to get it back on after charging for multiple hours, even overnight. It would appear to not be charging and then suddenly be at 100%.

Mi Solucion

The repair went smoothly. I watched the video once, but it was the step-by-step guide that I followed while I was working, especially the comments from other users of the guide. Their experiences and suggestions were valuable. The only hiccup was when I broke the second adhesive strip, but the provided tweezers were small enough to get under the battery. It took several long minutes, but I was able to gather enough of the adhesive to finish pulling it, without resorting to the heating option.

Mi Consejo

The best comment I found and followed was to remove the vibrator. That should be an official part of the guide, as it helped me to pull the adhesive strips out at a lower angle, and it would've been nearly impossible to recover the broken strip with the tweezers if the vibrator had been in place.

Mi Problema

The screen cracked after a drop. Seemed like a good idea to replace screen and battery.

Mi Solucion

Great. Screen works perfectly. The battery holds a charge.

Mi Consejo

Be very careful opening the case. It takes a bit of pull and, if not immediately checked, you'll rip the button cable. The adhesive strips are awesome. Follow that part of the guide closely.