@Ian_Thomas 
The socket is definitely the weak part of this operation. I also spent a significant amount of time on my FW13 (the first one I did the rework on) working something up after cracking mine. Thankfully the second one went much smoother, either due to increased diligence, familiarity, or even just variation in the parts.
If something could be done to reduce the diameter of the replacement just a bit it would go a lot smoother for folks, I think.
Yes, the socket is a weak element and the fake battery a bit too big, but at this point I doubt that Framework will send it back for adjustment. Ah well.
The PCB dimensions are sized to make sure that the board makes good contact to the contacts, while still being possible to insert without breaking the receptacle. It can be neither larger nor smaller while satisfying those requirements. We tuned this carefully after several rounds of iteration. The reason an actual coin cell is easier to insert and remove is because coin cells have a rounded shape in 3 dimensions. A round PCB is just a cylinder. As folks have noted throughout this thread (and we emphasize in the Guide), you can insert the PCB without breaking the socket if you do so carefully, and you can also easily break the socket if you do not insert the PCB carefully.
A decent explanation, if not a mea culpa for not handling the fix in-house.
Again, please keep this topic on-track for rework instructions, experience, etc.
If you want to talk about “the issue” there are other threads to go find.
As far as I know the only forum for such discussion is on Reddit, not here. Are you a moderator or Framework employee?
No, but I am a moderator, and I’ve already warned the same thing in this topic at least twice.
Additional off-topic replies will be removed.
Sorry, never any intention to be off-topic regarding the fake coin battery fix.
I did the rework on my two 11th gen Intel Frameworks. I’m two for two broken battery holders. I was incredibly careful trying to install the modules. It felt like the modules couldn’t fully get under even one side of the holder due to their thickness. I ended up doing this on both laptops:
Seems to work.
These bits broke off in both holders after I wedged the module under them and tried to push it down to get under the bottom half of the holder:
I broke the rest in order to remove it from the board.
More detail please. Not entirely sure my eyes are telling me how you did this.
Removed the broken battery holder plastic. Desoldered the lower battery contact. Covered the PCB with electrical tape to protect the traces. Soldered a short wire to the underside of the module. Soldered the other end of the wire to the lower contact solder point. The insulation of the wire protects it from touching the outer ring of the module, this preventing a short. Finally I soldered the outer ring of the module to the top battery contact. Finally I covered the module with a layer of electrical tape.
Hello, I have run into some issues and I want a sanity check before I give up hope.
I have broken off the battery holster and solder pad in a similar manner to Tom1. I tried to repair it by soldering directly to the trace. Then, I ripped off the entire trace, so it is a worse situation than him.
I use my mainboard as a server, so it will never go more than 1-2 hours without power (unless disaster strikes). However, there are some non-negotiable BIOS settings that must be set, so if the BIOS is reset with every unplug, then this is unusable for me. I use a strange software stack that requires a physical unplug of the motherboard rather than rebooting from the operating system.
I attempted the RTC repair so that I could use the main battery as a UPS, but I am willing to live without such a UPS if I can save my BIOS settings.
Am I out of luck?
Which trace? Pictures? Is the trace fully ripped off or still attached on the end?
You or someone else could follow the trace and find another point to connect a wire. But it might be a much smaller point than the original pad. So you might need practice before attempting it.
Keep in mind, the RTC battery substitute module allows the main laptop battery to power the RTC circuit instead of the RTC battery, so if you use the substitute module and no main laptop battery, the RTC circuit will power down any time you remove power from the mainboard, even for a moment.
Someone else will have to clarify if the BIOS re-sets any time the RTC circuit is no longer powered. But I noticed you said the mainboard will never go without power for more than 1-2 hours in most cases. Just be aware, that the battery substitute module doesn’t power the circuit at all if there is no laptop battery connected.
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.
