~Toughbooktalk~

I got a guy here on the rig with a generic, china made android tablet. The power port broke off. I took it apart to see if it was just one wire but the thing broke clear off. It was one with 3g cell phone internet. He used to talk to his family at home. Been trying to see what I can do to help him. The only thing I can think of is come up with some kind of charger and splice it into his battery cable.

Any ideas? The charging port is completely gone and I don't have anything to solder that small.

I would rig up a solder iron. Clamp a nail or pin with vise grips and heat it with a torch.

With the charging socket gone, there will be no way to switch between battery and AC. Completely remove the battery and leave it out.
Cut the plug off the adapter and solder it direct to the board.
Removing the Li Ion battery prevents explosions.

Did you ever know Joe McGee? If this isn't a ranch/farm type fix I've never seen one.

Does anyone appreciate Shawn the way that I do?

Thanks Jeff,
but I did not use baler twine or fence wire.

I am going to talk to the guy more about it today when he gets up. He is working 6 hrs opposite of me. How the board is made, it's going to be hard to solder it, it broke clean off the board leaving only the dots on the board. We have a solder iron on the rig, but it only has the big fat ends.

I wasn't sure if I could find the correct voltage for the battery and find a old adapter in the old box of chargers down stairs if charging directly to the battery would work worth a crap or not.

It's some no-name tablet.

Paul,

DO NOT CHARGE DIRECT TO THE BATTERY

Li Ion batteries are highly explosive if overcharged. We don't know if the charging control circuit is on the tablet mainboard or inside the battery.

The ONLY SAFE option is to connect a charger to the solder points where the broken power socket came off..You can try to follow the traces and see where they go. You may get lucky and find a better solder point..

If you have extra tips for the solder iron, you could grind one down or use a 1/4 inch hose clamp to clamp a small pin / nail to the existing tip.

That is why I was trying to learn what this "thing" has in it before doing anything. Let me take it back apart and look at the charging port better. I am starting to think it's a lost cause.

I know I could patch something for me and get by with it, but that would be like loaning a non gear head friend you car that is only gear head safe, lol.

Amen

The problem I think you'll have with removing the battery completely is that the charging port may not be able to power the device by itself. My tablets and phones all use micro USB charging, but none of them will work without the battery installed. Granted, that's 5V USB, with all its limitations, but I've seen the same thing with dedicated charging ports.

Also, the battery is likely a different voltage than the charger, and the charger is regulated with onboard circuitry before being sent to the battery or the rest of the electronics. So splicing into the battery cable might not work, either.

If you have to MacGyver something, maybe 5 C- or D-size flashlight batteries in series would get you close enough to the original lithium-ion pack's voltage (7.4v typically) to splice into the (removed Li-Ion's) battery cable and run the device. Then you could just replace them when they died. That may not even work though since the LiIon pack likely has an onboard microcontroller that the device motherboard may need to talk to before it powers up.

Agree about battery is less voltage than adapter. LIon cells are ~3.8 v each, so 2 cell battery = 7.6v and 3 cell = 11.4 v when charged.
MacGuyver idea is ingenious indeed. Can always stuff the dead EverReadies into a recharger and use the ones that don't blow out . . .