Anybody got a dead droid they wanna donate?

[cggorman]

I'm wanting to design and fabricate a passive cooler for the Droid CPU, but I need a donor phone to tear down and evaluate/measure before I do anything. Unfortunately, I'm a starving engineer and I can't afford to mess up my only phone during teardown. If the phonewreck pics are any indication, the panel I plan to remove should just peel off, but appearances can be deceiving and there is much to be learned in doing the job one's self.

 

[cggorman]

Rescue from page 2

 

[oakley1261]

I assume you are talking about the plastic "camera" piece that says google on it. Under that is the plastic part of the shell. If you cut this away, you might be able to make a mini alluminum heatsink to replace the camera cover if you cut out the plastic bar that it sticks to. But it would have to be very thin. Look at the droid teardown pic's, it should give you a general idea of the layout if you havn't seen it yet.

 

[OMJ]

try ebay I see broken droids on there from time to time that go pretty cheap

 

[cggorman]

I assume you are talking about the plastic "camera" piece that says google on it. Under that is the plastic part of the shell. If you cut this away, you might be able to make a mini alluminum heatsink to replace the camera cover if you cut out the plastic bar that it sticks to. But it would have to be very thin. Look at the droid teardown pic's, it should give you a general idea of the layout if you havn't seen it yet.

That's the basic plan. Want to use copper with micro fins. I can design and machine from barstock, but want it to be reversible in case of warranty issues. That's why I don't want to tear into a perfectly good unit...despite the phonewreck pics, im still not comfortable enuf to dig into mine just yet. If I scrap that plastic panel taking it off, I'm screwed. Even then, I suspect. I'll. Need to cut it in order to retain the lens and flash protection...unless I Fab a small replacement from lexan or similar.

 

[oakley1261]

I really don't think there would be a way to do it without voiding the warranty. You would have to cut the top that goes over the circuit board that the camera lense plastic piece sticks to. And on the circuit board, every chip is covered with a cage soldered to the board. And taking the phone apart is a big PITA. You have to be careful with every little step when you do. The second you don't think you need to be careful is the second you pop off a button, or crack a piece of plastic, or rip a ribbon cable.

If you really wanted to experiment with it then yeah, you might want to buy a broken droid or something. But I really don't think you will be able to make a heatsink for the processor without voiding the warranty unfortunatly.

 

[cggorman]

I noticed that cage. That's what started me thinking about it. Well, that and the enormous amount of heat coming from behind that little panel. I was planning on using copper for it's thermal conductivity and a dab of arctic silver on that exposed piece of the cage to help dissipate heat more effectively. Even that little bit would at least quadruple the dissipation rate. NFW is that plastic panel conducting the heat away very efficiently...but it sure is cheap to produce and assemble. And certainly more than adequate for a 550Mhz droid. But mine isn't at 550Mhz anymore. LOL

 

[inssane]

I wonder, since the Droid X is at 1Ghz, if they redesigned that panel to be cooler and if it could be swapped into the Droid 1.
If you know what I mean.

 

[OfficeLinebacker]

Did you have any luck getting an old, dead DROID? I am engaged in a similar quest.

 

[OfficeLinebacker]

I went ahead and started a thread in the Classifieds forum. Please check there and respond to that thread:

http://androidforums.com/classifieds/209211-your-dead-droid-milestone.html

If I get more replies than my need I'm happy to refer to OP of this thread, please indicate if you're still looking.

Thanks.