Today I decided to rebuild my trusty old iPod nano 6G. The battery was shot and the display was broken in the corner from smacking into things, something that happens to every watch I own without fail.
Disassembly went fine, but it took a bit of work to do the battery. Rather than desolder and resolder on the circuit board I cut the wires and spliced them, and insulated with some heat shrink. It was a little tough thanks to those itty bitty wires, but that got done.
I reassembled everything with the new screen, although I didn’t stick the screen back in place. It’s always going to be in that watch band, so I’ll just let the band maintain pressure on the screen, and this will make it a little easier to take apart when I eventually need to replace the battery again. This little shortcut is what will come back to bite me. The band, as you see from that image, will also do a good job of keeping me from cracking the new display.
I plugged it in and it started to take a charge. The screen responded fine, but there was a pressure spot in one corner. I thought that I was going to have to replace the screen, thinking I had damaged it during installation, but as it turns out the pressure was caused by the internal shield; I didn’t get it installed quite right and it was hung up on a lip. The screen looked great when the pressure was removed, so once the shield was back in the correct place I went to slide the iPod back into the band. That’s when it happened...
Being as old as I am I’ve finally realized it’s time for reading glasses, or more likely, bifocals. I had my glasses off and was just a few inches away as I slid the iPod back into the band. In my haste to reassemble I guess I didn’t apply enough pressure to get the LCD fully under the lip of the band, and as a result the screen exploded. Right in my face. Little glass shards into my mouth and eyes. Ouch. And not tasty.
Well, more like little particles to be honest, like very fine sand. I think I’m OK, and I don’t know if the minor pain in my eyes is just from being tired or from the glass. I guess I’ll know in the morning. Before I sleep, however, it’s time to hit FleaBay and order another screen...