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...
EDIT: Apologies all, I'm having trouble with Lemmy today, and it's not letting me reply.
I'll try to reply tomorrow, but in the meantime;
It's a Stonebook branded Clevo n751BU, a 7th gen i5. It's held up respectably well until it appears to have been knocked in the corner where the hinge is. The plastics on both sides of the hinge have given out.
I've ordered a replacement base, but the palm rest which is pictured is not available anywhere that I can find. I'm going to dismantle the hinge to clean and oil it, then reassemble it slightly less tightly, and epoxy the screws into place. The reason for taking it apart in the first place was to add a third hard drive. It has an nvme drive, and I had two HDDs going spare that can hold my documents and music. They're being synced now as I was having problems doing it remotely, but once they're in they can be managed with Syncthing. The laptop shouldn't need to come apart agin afterwards :)
I've been building and repairing computers and laptops for about 30 years, so I'm comfortable with completely stripping it, and can use it as an excuse to give everything a clean again. Short of replacing these HDDs with SSDs, there's nothing else that can physically be upgraded, so I'm half tempted to glue it shut so that I don't get tempted again :D
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.
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).
Edit: no, as I said, that's absolutely fine if there is a chunk of sturdy plastic to accept the insert. I just wanted to present another plastic repair technique for the sake of completeness, if somebody stumbles into this comment section.
Yup, I do a lot of 3d printed projects and use these all the time. They're great