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Bought myself a "fixer upper"

red5

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May 14, 2016
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So I bought myself an authentic sva Zero squonk mod off eBay for £35 being sold as spares and repairs. The previous owner had left it in a cupboard with a battery in where it promptly auto fired (it fell over and landed on the button) and it was being sold as it wouldn't fire anymore (fried board/mosfet).

The good news is that the board has in fact survived, it wouldn't fire because it was swimming in eliquid, it was literally oozing out from under the front plate. I managed to get the front carbon fiber plate off and clean all that off.

Now onto the bad news ... there appears to be a Beauty ring melted on the top, and the area surrounding the 510 plate has partially melted away which is probably where all the eliquid was coming from. At this stage I think I'll make a bigger mess of the top if I try and remove the beauty ring so it looks like I've got a permanent catch cup :P.
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Now two possible fixes spring to mind;

1 bodge it with some sort of epoxy to fill the gap.
2 get the original 510 out and fit something bigger to get rid of the gap.

Removing the 510 could be tricky because the negative lead is soldered to the back of the securing nut.
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So any thoughts suggestions from the more experienced modders out there?
 
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The ring is a cast and press fitted affair for me I would mill it out recess a new 510 then lath the 510 top cap down to fit the recess
 
Nice idea stu but i don't have a workshop :P
My current thinking is that I'll try and desolder get the old 510 and get that removed when I have some spare time at weekend. I'm going to have to be super careful not to melt anything though as that negative contact is way in back and super close to the Delrin body. Hopefully I can then source a 22mm squonk 510 to cover the mess up top and solder stuff back together.
 
Good find mate!! No problem with a permanent catch cup, atty on top of that is going to hide any of the blemishes anyway.

If the board is working OK how is the rest of it holding up? Have you used a meter to see if it all works OK? What's stopping you whacking a battery in there if the board is working OK?
 
Hi @junglist. Yup I've had a battery in and it's working :) I don't want to use it as is because I suspect juice is flowing down under the gap around the 510 and making it down into the board and face plate. Hopefully something like a 22mm modmaker 510 will sort that out.

There's no way I would have bought this at the full price (around 300 euros) but at £35 I figured it was worth a punt even if I had to replace the board/mosfet and 510, assuming I don't damage it any further in my ham fisted attempt to fix it. As a bonus it's one of the newer ones with a board in there rather than the originals which just had a switch and mosfet.
 
Ah I get you. Yup, definitely a good buy IMO and even better now you have confirmed it is mostly working!! Let us know how you get on, be interesting to see how you get on with removing the 510.
 
Hi, looking at the pictures i may jave an idea how to pop that 510 out. It seems that if you desoldered the positive, then pop a small rod or allen key into the hole on the neg nut to hold it in place, the 510 may just unscrew using a driver in the notches. Hope this helps.
 
@Loco yes it's held in by that nut but if you look closer there's a metal bar that runs from the negative battery contact, around the back of said nut and then into the back of the board to complete the negative side of the circuit. The sticking point is that bar is directly soldered to the nut, it's in a bloody awkward spot to get at and the body of the mod is delrin (plastic).
 
Ah i got that. I was suggesting you hold the nut in place and turn the 510 inside it :)
 
According to a video I watched on YouTube its a 3 part 510 assembly and that would simply remove the middle part that the 510 pin screws into but leave the main 510 housing in place unfortunately.
 
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