Vostro 1500 JB Weld Hinge Repair

I have gotten in several several laptops where the hinge mounting points have failed. Some of these were repaired using used parts or retrofits purchased off eBay. The recent owner of a Vostro 1500 wanted his fixed as cheap as possible and didn't care much about looks.

I opened the thing up and realized that the entire back screen bezel was going to need replacement as all these parts are integrated. I also noticed that the design of the setup along with the use of thin pot metal around these mounting points was just asking for trouble. The other hinge wasn't broken yet but cracks were visible and it was getting pretty loose feeling so it was also about to break.

The replacement parts were expensive and were no better made than the original ones that had failed. I also figured that going cheap and getting a used part would just make it fail that much sooner as it would have been loaded by many cycles of opening and closing the laptop lid.

So, I decided to use JB Weld on both hinge mounts to fix the broken one and reinforce the one in process of failing. I used a small amount of brake parts cleaner on a rag to clean the mating surfaces and then cut small pieces of aluminum to serve as reinforcement patches and roughed up one side for better bonding. These sheets of aluminum were actually left from my first project involving JB Weld (see below).

I welded this yesterday and filled in all the sharp angles, etc. with JB Weld to repair and reinforce this part. I put an aluminum sheet on both sides of the broken mount and one side of the failing mount (I would have had to break it the rest of the way to get one on the back side which I didn't want to do). This has been curing for over 16 hours but I really want to let it go over 24 hours (two overnight periods) before putting it back together and stressing it. I also added some more of the product last night to fill in some of the sharp angles likely to be stressed. I may have to Dremel out some of this compound to re-assembly but want it as strong as possible. My gut tells me that this may not look pretty but will likely be stronger than new.

I have become a huge fan of JB Weld epoxy over the past year or so and have used it on countless repairs. This stuff is for what duct tape won't fix and I always keep some on hand. My first experience was with a couple packs of the $5 stuff that saved me over $100 repairing a cracked oil pan. The part itself isn't that expensive but the labor was quoted over $1000 as the engine would have had to have been removed from the vehicle! This was a slow leak so I thought about living with it but hate oil mess from leaky vehicles so I decided to try fixing it myself.

I waited until I was ready for an oil change and drained all the oil and let it drip for a week. I then spent several days removing all oil residue from the inside and out of the oil pan with brake parts cleaner (I sprayed it with the red straw up through the drain plug hole). I didn't really like having this kind of solvent inside the engine but knew it had to be PERFECTLY clean, especially of oil, to work.

I then bought a sheet of aluminum from Lowe's and cut it to size to fit over the cracked area. I roughed up one side of this sheet and the bottom of the oil pan with a Dremel tool wheel and then ground a V-groove in the bottom of the cast aluminum oil pan along the crack. I filled the groove with JB Weld and then JB Welded the aluminum sheet I had cut to the bottom of the oil pan and let this cure for 2 days.

I then refilled the engine with oil and disconnected the distributor wire and cranked it over for several minutes. I did this so any part of the engine that might have been starved of oil due to the extended draining or use of solvents would be coated in oil before starting the engine.

This was about a year ago and I have put over 10k miles on the truck since I did this and have no signs of a leak.

I will let you know what happens with the laptop hinge when I put it together tonight or tomorrow but want it to get plenty of cure time.

Conor