I’ve just finished getting my laptop set up the way I like it, including maximising the RAM and upgrading the screen. I opened it up to use it, and the screws on the hinge tore through the plastic.
To top it off, the plastic on the bottom of the laptop, the side that’s been removed here, has also broken.
My wife definitely didn’t drop the laptop while she was tidying up though…
This happened on a decent spec’d HP laptop I bought my mom a couple years back. No easy way to repair without ordering new hinges that were impossible to find and the PC repair shop quoted over $500 repair on a $700 laptop when it was new.
Now she just leaves the laptop open in the 180 degree position with the laptop being held into a stand & bungie cord strapped to it to prevent it from falling foward. It is now a desktop PC and no longer a laptop.
I was debating doing something similar, and putting it behind the TV to replace the Fire Stick, but I’ve found what looks like compatible plastics on ebay. My base has broken quite badly too, so replacing both is going to be my best bet.
Daft question, but have you tried ebay for the hinges, or a spares or repairs listing?
I gave it a very short search back when it broke last year. I went with the cheapest way to get it back up and running which was just convert it to a desktop. She never goes anywhere with a laptop in the first place so there was no need to make it portable again.
She’s retired and just used it to surf the web. A Chromebook would work perfectly for her if she was not dead set of having Excel for her recipes and bill tracking.
Fair enough :)
She sounds similar to my mother. She’s got a laptop that never moves too, but refuses to consider a desktop 🤷🏻♂️
You could also just keep it closed and set it to do nothing on screen close. Then enable WoL.
My work laptop lives under my router, and I just remote into it daily.
I assume she’s using a separate keyboard/mouse, right? Though I’m enjoying the mental picture of someone trying to touch type on a vertical keyboard.
I did not want to deal with the remote IT support of it all, so I plugged in a mouse/keyboard and a second monitor to make it more like a desktop PC setup, lol.
That’s the way to do it. I used a broken laptop like that as my daily driver for a few years after losing my desktop and being unable to replace it.
JB weld epoxy might be a good choice if you either don’t plan on replacing the screen again, or to recreate the holes and patch the cracks if you pull it all the way apart again. I did it to the back of a tv when the vesa screw mounts ripped and it held for another 5 years.
I’ve been looking at replacing the mounts with brass ones, but as it’s an old laptop, I should be able to get a replacement case for around £40. I don’t really want to spend any more, but if I can get the case I’m going to go down that route :)
For sure take the case if it’s affordable! It’ll look much nicer afterwards too
You’ve gotta get those screws to the right torque after taking it apart. Too loose OR too tight and you’ve sealed your fate.
Oh I hate these shitty joints that are designed to fail eventually. It’s just not made to last.
Counterpoint, sometimes stuff is designed to break so something else more critical of expensive to replace does not.
Sure, but in this case that’s just not true
Laptop repair guy here! This problem is common in consumer grade laptops. As far as I am concerned, it’s purposefully weakly designed, because these break a LOT.
Not the hinge is broken, but the mounting points for the screws that keep the hinge in place. Sometimes it breaks on the bottom case, sometimes it breaks on the screen side.
We fix these issues regularly with epoxy (and massive skillz, lol). With most hinges, you can adjust the force a little lighter to relieve the pressure on the mounting points. That way it doesn’t fail again, after repair.
Machinist guy here!
Threads fail. Threads are generally the most likely thing to fail in any given mechanism. Generally, when the threads are expected to do more work than just sit there and not move, as in fastening a hinge for example, we try to make sure the threads are all the same kind of material.
I would never expect plastic threads to hold up to repeated use with an iron bolt inside. Something is going to give up, and it’s going to be the soft plastic threads, every single time.
Think about cheap as fuck IKEA furniture, any time they have a bolt to screw in, you install an insert first. We do the same thing in plastic, aluminum, shit even steel sometimes if we want the bolt to fail first.
I believe you misunderstood the problem, the threads are not usually the problem, the problem is the brass heat insert the hinge threads into, the insert just breaks off the plastic with the screw still threaded in, usually because the hinge is a bit too tight/rigid and puts a lot of force into the insert pulling it out
this seems to be the case in this picture as well
As far as I am concerned, it’s purposefully weakly designed, because these break a LOT.
Could be sacrificial because the plastic case is cheaper/easier to replace than whatever else would break instead of it were stronger.
Probably more so cheaper to mold the plastic case with weak threads than any other function.
This is correct and good advice. I’d like to add that it’s also an option to glue in a threaded metal insert in case a self - tapping plastic screw was used and the original thread is stripped.
I just used the threaded metal inserts and seat them with the soldering iron to use orignal screws and have had great luck
Edit/ I should clarify that it’s been a few years since I’ve done one of these repairs and may not be the best option on a newer/slimmer model
Absolutely, if there is enough plastic left, melting is one of the best options. That also enables mending plastic by melting in metal pins or strips via a cheap plastic welder for 10 bucks (success can be great, but it’s highly dependent on the geometry and how things broke).
Yup, I do a lot of 3d printed projects and use these all the time. They’re great
This is why I love the idea of framework laptops
Indeed, different price point though, but shouldn’t be more expensive in the long run. I like what they’re doing and live my AMD 13
I very much hated working on hinge damage.
How can I adjust the force?
Let the hate flow through you!
I just barely got this joke. Nice one
Actually if you want a serious answer, I usually try to apply force as close to the hinge as possible when opening and closing the lid. This way the full length of the screen isn’t acting as a lever multiplying the force on the relatively short span of the hinge mounting bracket.
I definitely agree this is too common a problem not to be by design.
by loosening the screws of the hinge.
Is it possible that some hinges have hidden screws or use a different mechanism?
Yes, absolutely. Not all hinges are adjustable, unfortunately. In fact, I’d argue that most are not. Just have a look at the hinges at your place (doors, cabinets, toilet seat etc.), most will be very simple mechanisms with no inbuilt adjustment.
You can adjust the play mechanically, of course - that is, through application of a certain amount of force via deformation, which can be a destructive process if not done carefully.
There are hinges that expose an axial screw that allows for precise adjustment of hinge friction, but I have not seen those used for laptop display lids (nor did I personally encounter those in the small dimensions you would find on a laptop) . You’ll find examples of those at Misumi or McMaster - Carr.
If your goal is to increase the friction in your laptop’s display lid hinges, you might find that simply tightening all screws of and around the hinge often does the trick. Even though the main axial screw is not meant to be user accessible, it serves basically the same function and can tighten up the hinge. Tightening the screws used for mounting will ensure the lid doesn’t wobble. You will have to (partially) take your laptop apart for that, naturally.
If your hinge doesn’t have an axial screw at all and uses, let’s say a pin, you might have to employ another method, but that would really depend on the actual mechanism being used.
I used to work in a computer repair shop. Unfortunately this is a lot more common than you might think, and it’s almost always due to poor quality plastic and nothing to do with the end user. Sadly I’ve yet to see a case where this is covered under the warranty either, but it’s worth a shot if you want to go through the headache of their customer support.
You can try epoxy like someone else mention, but it comes with a few problems you might encounter. First you can’t put too much epoxy or it’ll spill over onto the computer components (which could damage them) and as a result it may not hold. Second, even if it does hold you’re putting it over screws, which means you most likely won’t be able to remove those screws down the road if you ever have to repair or upgrade it.
You could also just leave the laptop permanently open and never touch the hinge. Some people already this anyways with their devices so for them it’s not worth the hassle. As long as nothing else is damaged and you’re careful with it, this can work too.
Ultimately, the best solution is to just replace the plastic casing part where it ripped out of, which is usually either the housing around the keyboard and track-pad, or the one behind the LCD. Sadly because all the parts are likely made with poor quality plastic this is likely to happen again down the road. In your case it looks like the former, the housing around the keyboard. For some devices the keyboard isn’t easily removable from this housing, so it’s probably going to require you replace the keyboard as well, unless you like dealing with tiny rivets.
Oh, and you probably don’t need to replace the hinge itself. like I said it’s usually the brittle plastic in the housing that’s at fault, not the hinge seizing and refusing to move.
At least it didn’t crack the screen with the bad hinge. I think it happens when the screws get a little loose and the angles shift. I work k-12 edu and have seen hundreds of Chromebooks do this.
Don’t scare me, I haven’t fixed it yet 😅
You’re already working on it so you’re good. We’ve just had kids ignore it too long which causes more issues. Just don’t force it lol.
Did you open it without the backplate on?
Anyways this is crappy anti consumer design by the manufacturer.
Yes and no. The backplate was attached but broken, and I didn’t realise that the broken piece was where the third screw for the hinge was.
In fairness to the manufacturer, this is a 7th gen i5, and it was doing great until my wife ‘definitely didn’t drop it’ on the corner >.<
I don’t understand why you were downvoted for asking this question. I’ve literally watched techs cause this damage by trying to open the lid with the back cover screws removed.
Most laptops have at least one screw on each side that goes through both the back cover and the lid. If the hinge is normally affixed with 3 screws and you open the lid with one missing, each mount is taking on that extra stress.
Best practice is to reinstall those screws before opening the lid with the back cover removed.
I broke a hinge myself that way, learned it the hard way
Honestly, this looks like it would be repairable with the appropriate sized heat-press insert, and a longer screw. Granted, things are pretty tight in that area; but it looks like there is enough beef left on the underside to repair this ‘properly’.
This is why if you need a budget laptop get something from a used business line like lenovo thinkpad dell latitude and hp elitebooks these will have far better quality and be (in some cases) more easy to repair
In fairness to them, this is a Stonebook branded Clevo laptop, and it’s a 7th gen i5, so it’s been doing well :)
HP by chance? Had this happen to a 360 HP laptop (and I almost never used that functionality!), repaired by replacing the backside of screen where it screws in. This of course required disassembling the whole damn laptop I was horrified by how cheap it was and now have a ThinkPad T480.
My HP’s hinge broke, too. I had to pack the entire back of the case with putty in order to fix it, and it’s still not quite right.
ooh my old laptop had a problem like this too, but instead of ripping off it just got so rigid it would probably completely destroy the whole hull if i tried to force it open, to “fix” it, me and my cousin just opened the laptop and (carefully /s) completely removed the hinges (or at least the part of it that connects to the base of the laptop), now it is right beside me here hosting a jellyfin server with the screen being propped up only by a wi-fi router >:3
That was going to be its fate if I couldn’t get the parts :)
Yep, happens a lot, I’ve got a cute little pair of nuts that replaced the inserts in my thinkpad
Used to do laptop repair. It’s insane how often this happens with the crappy plastic shells.
Laptop hinges are the worst, cant imagine how many laptops I’ve seen with cracked plastics where the hinges are.
