That should be an easy to fix for a micro soldering repair shop, you just scrape away solder mask until you arrive at where the pad connected to previously and then you solder on the substitute module as usual.
Don’t do this as a noob, find someone who is experienced in micro soldering and has the proper tools.
I have fixed the problem. I lost the original battery holster and miraculously Framework sells every part except that. So I had to DIY a solution out of Dupont jumper and a power button header connector. I just stripped the end off of some wires and electrical taped it onto some batteries. I have done this with both the original battery as well as a standard non-rechargable CMOS battery, but I prefer the non-rechargeable battery.
I took some other cables, cut them shorter and soldered them back together, then soldered them back to the motherboard.
The connection that I thought was done for actually had a decent amount of trace left, I just had to scrape away the top layer of the motherboard. I then dropped a blob of solder onto the trace. Then I covered it with several layers of clear nail polish so that this connection would not come loose. Then I scraped off some of the nail polish and soldered the jumper cable to the blob of solder. Also the hot iron burned through the nail polish so I was able to make good contact that way. Then I covered the whole thing in even more nail polish so that it would not come loose during testing. Then I tested it and it works great.
Wait, non-rechargeable battery? You can’t use a non-rechargeable. The laptop was made only for rechargeables, it will be trying to charge any battery you plug in. A non-rechargeable will be damaged and over time may leak.
It could also damage the board.
As they said here, you can’t use a non-rechargable battery.
Is there any information regarding how long the main battery will keep the BIOS settings for when fully discharged?
I already saw a user who experience this loss on the new AMD 13.5 of settings after it was suspended for a few days and I assume 11th gen has worse power drain?
The AMD boards don’t have an RTC battery at all by default, so it’s fully dependent on you not running down the main battery.
11th gen boards do have an RTC battery, and with this rework fix it should be kept healthy. Presuming you didn’t keep the old RTC battery that potentially already saw excessive wear before the fix. I feel like I recall reading that a healthy RTC battery should take weeks at least before depleting. Someone correct me if they recall more exactly the time Framework has said.
Are you maybe thinking of the first rework offered? IIRC that was to allow the RTC battery to be charged by the main battery as well as (or maybe instead of) from mains. This rework removes the battery for a PCB and powers the RTC from the main battery.
Right, I think this rework makes the 11th gen more similar to the current models that use the main battery as an RTC but I have not seen mentioned how long the RTC can function when the battery depleted.
IIRC the drain on the RTC circuit is high for 11th gen (part of the issue I think) so I assume it will be worse than later models.
Ah, you are quite right. Apologies.
No problem, thanks 
This is the especially scary part. The “leak” will be corrosive and can damage the board.
I’ve replaced the RTC battery on one of our two 11gen laptops. Soldering was done at a local electronics repair shop, but before taking the laptop there I had slotted the replacement board in myself, wanting to avoid complications due to the fragility of the holder.
As others have mentioned, the replacement board is considerably thicker than the battery cell it’s replacing, so inserting it to the holder was a slightly fraught process.
At first the replacement was slotted in fine, but it looked to me like the small top tab of the bottom right “arm” of the holder wasn’t over the replacement circuit. So I tried to gently push it back while pushing/holding the circuit down.
You guessed it, that broke that bottom right arm off:
Despite that the RTC replacement still seems secure. The shop didn’t seem to have any issues doing the solder, and in fact they discounted from their standard “mainboard repair” of $99 down to $75 since I had only left a trivial (to them) part of the job to be done.
The laptop is working fine, both on AC and off.
Any ideas on what type of epoxy/glue I could use to strengthen this so it doesn’t risk jiggling out of place due to the missing arm?
I don’t want to use any random glue in case of heat/conductivity issues.
Once this is done and the laptop has been through some daily use shakedown, I’ll try this with the other 11gen in the fleet. I’ll try to be less “greedy” on that one.
Epoxy has many different types, so I would guess that you can find one that is heat resistant. I would avoid any other glue, as there is nothing like Epoxy. I used it with plywood on boats and laminated wood was used by the Gougeon brothers in Michigan to manufacture early wind energy that did not use steel that ended up fracturing in competitors models. Of course they could not compete with GE for government contracts.
FWIW, I must have spent 20 minutes carefully inserting the dummy battery in my 11 and managed to not break it off, but it was touch and go.
I know, I kind of kick myself, I also spent a long time and it was in. Then I tried to make it better.
It wasn’t broken and you fixed it till it was. 
When I did the replacement myself a couple weeks ago I thought i would break it taking out the ML1220. And when i inserted the dummy I was almost 100% sure it would break. But I was lucky and it did not break.
I used a hair dryer to warm up the plastic of the empty RTC coin cell holder, the theory being it might make it a little more compliant. It did seem to help, inserting the top of the battery replacement module first, then using a SIM removal tool to apply slight leverage to the bottom of the holder, the module popped into place without too much drama.
Smart Cookie!
This sounds like a really good idea! 
I finally installed it the RTC Battery Substitute – more or less drama free!
The Substitute was definitely a very tight fit and I can see why it caused problems for people. It doesn’t quite hook under the two prongs on the north side when you’re trying to pivot it in. I hooked it under one retainer and then used a spudger as leverage to lift the other one up away from the motherboard just a little and rocked it around a little until it snapped under.
After getting The Substitute under the north clips it was still a bit of a tight fit to get it under the south retainer fingers – but a little coaxing with the spudger got it in on that side quite a bit easier than it was on the north side.
I’d recommend that people not try to force it in – just take the time with as many tries and as much jiggling to get it to seat easily without forcing.
The rest was pretty easy – a bit of time to get the wire taped in just the right position for soldering. The soldering space is pretty clear and relatively large. I got a friend with more soldering experience to do it for me, but I think really not anything for anyone with some soldering experience to fear.
Works flawlessly now – back to unconditional love for Framework! (Well, you know what I mean.)
ps. the “more or less” drama was I stripped one of the motherboard mounting screw inserts out of the chassis when re-installing the motherboard. Just careless over-torquing, really – no fault of the hardware. I was originally going to try gluing the threaded insert back into place but I wasn’t sure that I could definitely get it to drive past flush (which it definitely needs to be) without the adhesive setting so I decided to just leave out that screw. Definitely not ideal … but I’m pretty easy on my laptop and don’t carry it around a lot so pretty sure it will be fine. If/when I ever replace the MB I’ll probably try harder to repair that.
