Intro to bga reworking services

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I will start this thread to have pertinent information about getting involved with reworking ie; reflow reball

The company i work for has been in reworking for 3 yrs now, it is the bulk of our business

The benefit of reworking is fixing things that would otherwise be unfixable or too expensive to replace

Some examples:

CPU socket is faulty ie; wont detect CPU you can replace that with a fresh socket or put fresh balls on the socket

Laptops without power, many laptops have the SB chip which is the main chip on the board that controls i/o functions that will have the solder joints go faulty and by performing reworking on it power is restored

Note: some power issues are related to QFN chips, resistors, regulators, mosfets etc and in this case a reflow or reball will do nothing

Mainboard needs to be replaced and it is expensive and will take time to order but the customer needs it now, so simply rework the GPU and not have to worry about ordering parts

Cell phones have bga related issues as do tablets

Game consoles, TVs, GPS units, Motor Vehicle Gauges etc;

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Is it worth it:

That depends on may factors such as cost, time, space etc;

You HAVE to spend at minimum a grand to get started

If you wish to talk about griddles, heat guns, ovens, etc; i simply will not offer help or support on that as its an improper repair

It WILL probably work sometimes but if it does the repair will not last and this is why bga reworking has a bad name

Those devices above are PERFECTLY fine for small components but NOT for bga components, using larger nozzles etc; is not suitable at all

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Depending on which boards you are going to rework will depend on the machine that you use, if you are going to work on cell phones then a small $300 system will work just fine and i would recommend not going bigger as the boards are very small and you want a small machine

If you are going to work on laptops and Xbox 360, then a machine with about 3 240 x 60 heaters on the bottom will be suitable i prefer 4 but 3 will do the job since those boards are not as picky

For PS3 you MUST have at minimum 4 240 x 60 heaters for the bottom as those boards have several layers in the pcb and contain large bga chips plus the board is just huge

The reason you need proper bottom heating is because of board flex or warpage, if the board is not heated evenly it will bend in certain areas or may not heat the bga chip evenly causing solder ball bridges or shorts

So with that in mind you can get a decent machine for around $700 that will support 3 heaters or maybe 4

This is a machine that will work on laptops and Xbox 360s
http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=160992914003&ssPageName=STRK:MESE:IT

For PS3s this will do
http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=151015771038&ssPageName=STRK:MESE:IT

These are the cheapest machine that you should buy anything smaller or cheaper will not be sufficient and will cost you more in the end

Now if you buy the smaller machine due to a lack of funds, you are not totally lost because you can upgrade the heaters later and then work on larger boards without issue

These are german made heaters, you know the guys that make beamers
http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=160944472743&ssPageName=STRK:MESE:IT

If you do upgrade the heaters i recommend new relays or SSR, i bought mine from amazon that were made in USA opto22, relays control the heaters basically without relays the heat will always be on

IR heaters in most machines are made in china thus they dont last as long as others and they will not provide even heating

Also these machines are made in china so they do not pass safety inspections and some have reported the wiring catching fire etc;

Now this is not often but it DOES happen, it hasnt happened to me so maybe i am just lucky

I personally rewired my machine with thicker gauge so that way it was more efficient and safer

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Next is power issues, UK have no problem you guys have 220 and is best for those in the USA you have a few options buy a 110v machine which i do not recommend it will be a huge power hog, buy a 220v machine with transformer, personally i would not do it since a transformer is another piece of equipment that could go bad and if it does you have to order another, have a 220v line installed in your place

I did it myself and no i am not a certified electrician so dont take my advice as such i simply used common sense and research

Basically all buildings have 220 in the breaker box with 3 wires going to an outlet a live, ground and neutral

The neutral is basically another ground or vice versa

So get a double pole breaker and connect 2 lives and a ground thus eliminating the extra neutral

So with 2 lives meaning 110 x 2 = 220 or 120 x 2 = 240 which is still no problem as machines are rated up to work on 240 and that is the power that aussies use

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qdZFXNd2qN8

I am not responsible if you die, this video is made by a regular guy without a electricians license

If you hire an electrician, it should cost no more than $200

Many people use dryer plugs, but check google for that

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You will need some tools and accessories as well

Flux is a MUST, and there are tons ie; Amtech, Kester, Kingbo, Magic, Super bla bla

Amtech is SUPPOSED to be the best but there are SOOOOOOOO many fakes out there and if you do get original it will cost quite a bit

I use Kingbo, but i have all of the above fluxes and that was to do some testing in the end Kingbo was overall the best mainly because it lasted up to 240c in temperature where as most would burn out at 200c which is essentially useless for reworking BUT for soldering is fine

Alcohol, Acetone, Mek are cleaning chemicals

I use denatured alcohol most of the time it removes thermal compound pretty easy and cleans residue flux without issue
Acetone is stronger so i use that if needed and finally MEK is basically Acetone but doesnt dry as quick
IPA = Alcohol but you need 99% and its either hard to find or expensive, Denatured can be found at a hardware store sooooooooo i use that

If you get a board in that was previously repaired, which we do often they probably used some weird flux or other goo and it looks so awful so you must clean it off and that is where those chemicals come into play

Cleaning the heatsinks is also needed

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Supporting the board is CRUCIAL as you could have a million dollar machine if you dont support the board it will bend and flex

For game consoles there are pre made supports that fit the specific models
Other boards mainly laptops you can use the included support system that comes with machine since they are not as large or thick as game console boards but that may change

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That is all that is needed for reflow, if you want to reball you will need the following:
Solder balls
Rework jig
Vacuum pen
Stencils
Braid

Buy it pre made, piece it together however you want to do it you need those items
This is a pre made kit

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Using the machine is not super easy but not super hard and the machines above come with pre programmed profiles

A profile is basically the heating instructions you give the machine which include the temperature, time and speed
Speed is easy i just set it to 2 and its safe
Time is something you need to figure out by how long it takes to get to set point and how long you want it heated at that point
Temperature is the amount of heat generated at that time, your not going to go from 0 to 280 right away it has to be gradual or you will cause thermal shock

The pre programmed files should be used as a starting point and you will adjust the values based upon your environment, board type, flux used, machine type etc;

Most common way to control a machine is with a PID controller, they are also used in cooking and are relatively simple to use by following the manual closely

The controllers contain advanced features for fine tuning, but its best to leave them be and leave the default values set

There are then the touch screen controllers which are usually even easier to use but arent required, some of them have built in graphs to view the profile in action, the non touch models tend to offer PC control via serial or usb to start and stop the profile and watch the graph

YES its cool, but after a mth i stopped using the pc and controlled it from the controller since using a PC was just not needed

The profile is definitely a very important part of reworking as without proper instructions the machine can not do its job, and a properly set profile decides if you win or loose with repair

Many people borrow, trade, purchase profiles and this will go on for a while the fact is Joe can not use Bobs profile even if he has the same machine

His environment is different he may rework in a basement with humidity or by a lake with dry air etc;

Now there is no doubt that the profile MAY work, but it will not be optimal because you MUST develop your own and test it appropriately

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Reflow and Reball are essentially almost the same when you heat a chip and the connections are REflowed when you put new balls on a chip you have REballed it hence the terms
Now there is chip lifting and placing which is the better repair and involves reballing a chip and then reflowing it to the board

Reflow is NOT bad its simply been given a bad name and most people do not do it right as you must have the solder become liquidous for 30 to 90 sec but this is a problem for many as when the solder is liquidous they start cooling it or if they have improper equipment while the solder is liquid if the heat is not even or not properly bolted or supported it will flex

Improper equipment means you can not maintain a consistent temperature and with lead solder there is room for error at 200 to 220c but with lead free there is almost no room for error since you are close to the temperature tolerances most bga packages can go up to 250c some only 240c and since you have to hit around 235c to properly melt balls you are very close to danger zone and if your heat is not even the left side may be 245 while the right is 230c which means you may have killed the chip or the left side may be 220c and the right side is 227c so chances are the chip was not properly heated as only half the chip had the connections fixed so while it MAY work and you think you FIXED it and it will probably return to you for warranty purposes

With the the term reballing you simply do it all the same just lift so if part of the chip is not heated properly then well your going to lift traces and or pads which is EXTREMELY time consuming repair and most of the time not worth it anywho

This involves using a vacuum suction pen which grabs the chip and allows you to lift it off, these are usually calibrated with the right amount of vacuum but i dont know all the details all i know is it lifts but if there is too much resistance it generally wont allow you too but if you were using tweezers or pliers you would rip that sucker off

If you happen to get resistance when lifting which means if you lift and it doesnt just plop off then either the solder is not fully liquid or there is epoxy in the way

Epoxy is horrible and is always on laptops, usually i use some dull tweezers to remove it using an smt station with a small nozzle

So lets say you didnt lift pads but now you have to put balls on the chip so you clean the board and the chip, but its not that easy

Cleaning vid

Lets say you did everything right up until cleaning and you have a radio shack iron there is no way you can clean the way shown above, it will take a lot longer and you may not do a great job, or you will lift pads or damage the solder mask

Most of the time damage to pads occurs, solder mask damage is not as common and at this point you need a new chip however if this happened on the board you can now tell the customer you ruined there board as you were not qualified to do this repair

Cleaning is not DIFFICULT but it does require skill and the right tools, i was using a Hakko 937 which was so old and beat up but it worked well i bought it used off ebay just got a new tip and i was fine and for regular soldering it worked so well

For cleaning it worked but i had trouble and it took a long time to clean, i was able to improve my cleaning by using Kingbo flux and the best BGA braid i could find however i still had lifted pads and trace damage and i was unhappy and since it was MY fault i gave the customer a refurbished board

I ended up getting a better iron which supported cartridge style tips and this means the heater is in the tip but of course this is a specialty station so the tips and station are pricey but after i was able to clean a board in less time than it takes you to change channels i stopped crying on how much i spent

So if you did manage to clean it PROPERLY, since you invested time and money into the right tools and knowledge it is time to put balls on the chip

Get your girlfriend and have her do this part, they are usually better working with the balls, you need a jig and there are 2 types direct heat and non direct heat but i refer to the non as 90mm jigs and then you need direct heat stencils or 90mm stencils along with appropriate size solder balls

Usually 0.6mm, 0.5mm, 0.45mm, and 0.76mm are most common and it will say the size on the stencil, thank your local china man for that

Then you ensure everything is top notch clean and proceed to put balls on the chip, after you have it all aligned you heat the chip so the solder balls land on each pad and stay

With the fresh solder balls on the chip you place it on the board and reheat it after cool down you test and either it works or it did not

You need to align the chip PROPERLY on the board, there are many ways to do this and usually just by looking you can get it right, some boards have lines so you can position it right and others have so many balls and are huge chips it is an impossible feat and nobody can help you just takes practice

Now if you want to be a cheater, use this

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I tend to do reflows almost all the time, and only do a reball if necessary which means the flow was not successful or the chip was fried and you need a new chip
Sometimes customers are smart and request it upfront so we do it at that point

For repairs at our store reflows last a long time and we offer a 3 mth warranty on the repair but about 2% of customers return for warranty related issues
The reballs obviously last much longer and we barely get any of those back

Now in some cases if a reflow returns, we then do the reball and its fixed which means that either the previous repair was not done properly or the solder was just too weak or contaminated or it just wanted to be a pain

Some boards will arrive previously worked on, and there will be debris underneath the chip so we have no choice but to reball as a reflow will work but the debris will be in the way of the connection causing intermittent issues

Now just because you can lift chips and reball and reflow doesnt mean you have a great repair as a reball can come back in 24 hrs just as a reflow can due to improper heating meaning the solder did not melt evenly or fully

Usually if the chip is seated lower to the board it was flown properly provided its even on all sides, if that checks out its possible the chip was dying and when the customer used it the chip finally said bye time to die

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There are tons of machines, tools and accessories out there and you can buy them from China, US, UK, Japan, Chile etc;
Knowing who to buy from and which brand is a key to success, there are fakes and cheapo products out there

I have provided my product recommendations which you are free to follow or go on your own venture

We started with a manual machine, then went semi auto and now fully auto which is mainly the machine we use now
The manual was Quartz, the semi was IR and the full is Hot Air

Personally i prefer IR, but some people are vice versa and prefer HA
In my article below i go into the better details

Choosing a rework station
Proper reworking process
Reball Reflow

More coming soon, im tired so dont reply yet until i am finished with the important info
My grammar, spelling etc; is bad i know and is why i repair and do not revise reports
 
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Just to clarify, are you talking reflow, reball or both ? Because I think reflow is always going to be hit and miss no matter how good your technique is.
 
Can you consistently fix the problematic nVidia chipsets? Do you have a success rate for those? Also what is the warranty like should the problem recur?
 
Yes, I was wondering about the dreaded nvidias too.

I watched the video on the other thread but that was only replacing the surface mounted BGA solder 'dots'. AFAIK the nv problem was not the solder to the PCB but the actual packaging of the chips. The so-called underfill:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flip_chip#Disadvantages

Because that part of the wiki actually references the nv fiasco.

So the way I see this working is that as the chip is reworked the internal bumps inside the chips also melt and reflow. But surely that doesn't fix the underlying defect and I've never heard of anyone actually reworking the chips.

Just think about it: fixing a few 100s BGA dots in pachage say 40mm x 40mm is just about possible. Trying to fix a couple of hundred connections to the actual silicon which is 10mm x 10mm must be near to impossible except in a factory.
 
yes there are a few laptops that come with chips with bad manufacturing and thus must be replaced and those chips can be had via ebay for around $30 or less
 
Can you consistently fix the problematic nVidia chipsets? Do you have a success rate for those? Also what is the warranty like should the problem recur?

well each chip is different, i dont have enough data for that

i can not advise you on warranty as that will depend on your repair

the warranty we offer at our store is

reflow 3 mth
reball 6 mth

if we wanted to we could double the warranty, but instead we offer an extended warranty for $15
 
Thank you.

Thank you for an excellent post!

One thing that has got me thinking. Is it difficult to create personal profiles?

How would I know what to adjust for example enviroment?
 
Reflow is NOT bad its simply been given a bad name and most people do not do it right as you must have the solder become liquidous for 30 to 90 sec but this is a problem for many as when the solder is liquidous they start cooling it or if they have improper equipment while the solder is liquid if the heat is not even or not properly bolted or supported it will flex

But with a reflow the best you can possibly do is the same as what was done by the original assembly. Which failed and is why its back in the shop. However now the board has become contaminated, any flux is burned off and any corrosion or oxidization is now on the copper pads. So the best you can do is almost always going to be worse than what they originally did and you cannot be sure of the results due to the things I mentioned above.
 
But with a reflow the best you can possibly do is the same as what was done by the original assembly.

Even with a reball you are not going to get a better fit as the balls are the same material that the factory uses. The solder is not as soft as it was with lead which is now outlawed. This and a hot design is why we have this problem.

We give a 30 day warranty but if it fails we do not do it again we give you a credit towards replacing the motherboard with a pulled mobo/ or new one.

So basically we are doing labor free the 2nd time.

Our failure rate has been less than 1 in 10 overall. Might be one or two models that are a bit higher as we don't compare it by model.
 
But with a reflow the best you can possibly do is the same as what was done by the original assembly. Which failed and is why its back in the shop. However now the board has become contaminated, any flux is burned off and any corrosion or oxidization is now on the copper pads. So the best you can do is almost always going to be worse than what they originally did and you cannot be sure of the results due to the things I mentioned above.

Correct, so if the original assembly lasted 3 yrs then you can expect up to that amount with a reflow

If you use a reball then you can expect longer

Many people use aggressive fluxes which will cause contamination, which is why i use Kingbo its a no clean style flux

Now for those that just always use aggressive fluxes they put the board in an ultrasonic cleaner which removes any contamination

Cleaner

Solution
 
Even with a reball you are not going to get a better fit as the balls are the same material that the factory uses. The solder is not as soft as it was with lead which is now outlawed. This and a hot design is why we have this problem.

We give a 30 day warranty but if it fails we do not do it again we give you a credit towards replacing the motherboard with a pulled mobo/ or new one.

So basically we are doing labor free the 2nd time.

Our failure rate has been less than 1 in 10 overall. Might be one or two models that are a bit higher as we don't compare it by model.

You can buy solder balls of the same quality or better

Balls

Who said the manufacturer solder balls are high quality, have you contacted any of those companies and gotten confirmation

Judging by the crappy thermal compound they use, i would imagine they would not go after expensive balls
The goal of manufacturing is to reduce costs

If cheap balls are $5 and expensive are $8 x by say 20000 bottles of solder would cost them an extra $60k
I could be wrong, im horrible with numbers but you get the point now
 
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Correct, so if the original assembly lasted 3 yrs then you can expect up to that amount with a reflow...

But you wont guarantee more than 3 months ? I don't think ANYONE here believes a reflow is going to last 3 years. Even 12 months is too long. If I ever get back into this stuff it's got to be reball or nothing.
 
Nobody has to believe anything

As i mentioned i provide extended warranties as an option, why offer 12 mth if there is no need

Its optional and some customers choose that option

If you do reballs and no reflows than that is your decision and will provide better repairs and some business do that

We simply give the customer again options, we have all the info on our website and they choose reflow or reball
 
We found the best way to handle the this situation is like this:

We inform people that pcb's are manufactured under optimum conditions that cannot be duplicated in the field. A new motherboard is usually more $$$ than the cost of the laptop when purchased new.

Sometimes after market motherboards are available for some models and sometimes you can buy pulls or refurb motherboards at an affordable price and another option is for us to attempt to fix it, with no guarantees. It is broke now so if we cannot fix it we bare no responsibility.

If we fix it the labor to swap a motherboard is $99, the parts cost depending on what we find. We offer a motherboard PCB repair with no guarantees it works. It works about 80-90% of the time however if it doesn't work we don't charge you either the labor to swap nor the repair of the PCB price. If it works you pay the $99, plus $69-99 for mobo refurbishment. We offer a 30 day warranty. It is straight forward transaction easy to explain and easy to understand. What you got is crap now, if I fix it you pay a fee. If I don't fix it you are no worse off than you are now.

However if it doesn't work or if it fails shortly after the repair after it was paid for, then we credit what you spent already towards putting a aftermarket or new motherboard in your laptop with you paying only the difference. There will be no cash refunds.

This logic makes sense to most customers and gets you the deal. For the unfortunate few that fail shortly after they get the laptop back and paid the fees, you price a new motherboard or purchase of a new laptop and give them credit for what they spent.

In the last 8 years I can only think of 2 customers out of hundreds who were absolutely not pleased with the ultimate result and would not let me get them a new laptop or new motherboard with credit for the attempted repair.

We benefit from every repair either by getting paid to fix it, or by getting the old parts when the repair is not successful, we also get fees for backing up old data and transferring it to their new system.
 
First HP and their manufacturers buy solder by the ton price where you and I buy it by the ounce. I suspect that the difference between the best and worst solder is 10 cents a solder if that.

I find it unlikely that any manufacturer would purposely save 10 cents or even $10 on a part which ultimately destroys their own reputation of billions of dollars of annual sales on servers, workstations, printers and laptops and more. There is pressure to build cheap but not that much pressure. Secondly, Nvidia specs out the materials for their products which HP then has to agree to.

Just as you and I need our customers to come back to us to build a profitable supportable business so too do they.

I think more likely that we are using the same quality balls as they, perhaps even lower quality.

Perhaps this is part of a planned obsolescence of 3 years so people have to go back every 2 years to get a new computer....I don't know.

What we do, when we are successful is buy the customer another year or two before they need buy a new laptop.


You can buy solder balls of the same quality or better

Balls

Who said the manufacturer solder balls are high quality, have you contacted any of those companies and gotten confirmation

Judging by the crappy thermal compound they use, i would imagine they would not go after expensive balls
The goal of manufacturing is to reduce costs

If cheap balls are $5 and expensive are $8 x by say 20000 bottles of solder would cost them an extra $60k
I could be wrong, im horrible with numbers but you get the point now
 
But you wont guarantee more than 3 months ? I don't think ANYONE here believes a reflow is going to last 3 years. Even 12 months is too long. If I ever get back into this stuff it's got to be reball or nothing.

We give 30 days warranty, we actually do give credits for up to 90 days. The thing is that it would be stupid to offer more of a warranty than that when most retail laptops come with only a 90 day warranty brand new from their manufacturer, unless you buy an extended warranty from a 3rd party. Walmart, Office max, Office depot, Staples none offer more than 90 days warranty on these models.

There is not even the implication that we are making it as good as new let a lone better than new...so I think you need to lay off the weed a bit and think this through before you post such sillyness.
 
We do the same thing. We offer extended warranties for 10% on workstations and 15% on laptops (of the retail value of the item). Laptop extended warranty would be 12 months and workstation is 5 years. The economics are that we can easily repair and get parts for the workstations longer and cheaper than we can for the laptops.

Nobody has to believe anything

As i mentioned i provide extended warranties as an option, why offer 12 mth if there is no need

Its optional and some customers choose that option

If you do reballs and no reflows than that is your decision and will provide better repairs and some business do that

We simply give the customer again options, we have all the info on our website and they choose reflow or reball
 
There is not even the implication that we are making it as good as new let a lone better than new...so I think you need to lay off the weed a bit and think this through before you post such sillyness.

Nobody was talking about what you do or was making any implications about you claiming it to be as good or better than new so maybe you are the one that should lay off the "weed".
 
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