Repairing HP Pavillion (ZV6000) broken hinges

I have repaired the hinges on a HP Pavillion (ZV6000) for @ $6.00. I will warn that the new hinges have not been “time tested” but they appear to be working great.

The hinge failure is of the type where the hinge knuckle has broken in half in the screen lid. The knuckle is a cheap pot metal hinge and HP should be sued for not honoring the fact that the hinges suck. The following steps are what I did to repair the hinge.

The object is to rebuild the lid hinge knuckle from J.B. Weld.
Besides the tools in the tech manual you will need:
A small sharp pointed jack knife or xacto knife.
J.B. Weld (a two part epoxy used to repair engine blocks for years, available at hardware stores).
Download the maintenance manual for your notebook, the ZV6000 was at ZV6000 Tech Manual
Follow the instructions for removing the screen exactly as outlined in the manual unless I state an exception below.
Use the knife point to carefully remove the various screw covers. Chances are you will ruin some of them but they are mostly cosmetic.

When removing the keyboard the ribbon cable is held in by a pressure lock. DO NOT just pull a pressure lock must be released. Use the knife to slide the very small catches out from the ribbon connector on the left and right sides of the connector. The catches are grayish in color, the plug is white.

The manual has you disconnect the wireless micro-mini-rf connectors for the wireless antenna, it maybe safer to just release the catches holding the wireless card in place to remove it attached to the screen. The rf connecters appeared to be delicate yet tough to pop off and on. The board just pops out when the catches are released.

Once the screen is off, the hinge pin half will most likely fall out of place, as well as the broke knuckle pieces. Remove the broken knuckle parts and clean the inside of the remaining hinge knuckles and hinge pins with alcohol and a Q-tip. The parts must be as clean as possible.

At this point I put the battery back in to level the machine, lay the whole works on a large level table top in a safe location (you do not want the laptop disturbed for @16 hours).

Lay the cover back in place (w/o the hinges) and find objects to prop the cover at about a 5 degree angle. I used a small cigar humidor and adjusted the angle with a large pad of sticky notes by adding and removing sticky notes.

Once you have the screen angle right, adjust the hinge pines to line up with the angle of the remaining hinge knuckle that is in the screen lid (the hinge pin has a flat side). The hinges are tight, you will need pliers.

Mix the J.B. Weld according to instructions on the box; you will need a daub about the size of a marble. Let the J.B. Weld set up to almost putty; this will take about 45 minutes (the weld does not cure fast possibly to avoid shrinkage?).

Thickly coat the hinge pin with weld; ensure it is worked in to the small splines of the hinge pin. This will help make a better repair.

Work weld around the old knuckle and in the “tube” of the lid hinge. The important point here is to make the best blob of weld ATTACHED to the old knuckle half as possible. This blob will be your knew hinge so avoid as much air pocketing as you can. The screen “tube” will shape the new hinge.

Place the screen on your prop, push the hinge pins in the knuckle, screw the hinge in place form the top front only (do not move the screen at all from the angle you have set).

The final check before you leave it to set is to take a ruler and align the cover left to right with the body of the laptop. If you do not do this the lid will not shut!

You should now have a lid in place at 5 degrees, aligned to the computer, with hinges screwed in place and a wet knuckle joint. LET IT CURE AT LEAST 16 HOURS then:

Avoid over working screen hinges until the screws are put back in place at the back of the hinges!
Plug every thing back up and op check the video, wireless, and keyboard before reassembling the plastic covers.

 

Nice! However, I advise against putting the battery back in before the notebook is completely repaired and reassembled. The motherboard is "live" while the battery is in place, so if you accidentally short anything Bad Things can happen.

Also, you can get replacement hinges on eBay much of the time, but they will be used hinges pulled from other broken notebooks. highvswr's approach is probably superior.

 

If you are worried about shorting something out you should run the battery down before doing this. It is IMPORTANT that the battery be in as the computer does not sit level with out.
As far as finding hinges goes, that would be awesome and you could for go this whole thing. Getting in the panel is really difficult though as the bezel appears to be well stuck to the lcd screen.
The procedure I have outlined was obviously attempted after other avenues were exhausted. Unfortunately HPs solution of purchasing a whole lid for @ $200.00 still leaves you with the crappy hinge half in the lid. Could last 3 years or 3 days.
I will keep you posted as to weather or not this solution last 3 years or 3 days. I am sure of one thing..... J.B. Weld is some tough stuff, it can be machined.... I cannot say the same for the pot metal used to make the hinge in the lid.

 

As a side note... when your hinges have broke you get cracks in the hinge covers ( the "tube")... the J.B. Weld sealed these cracks and they are hardly noticable!
Man I hope this repair holds........

 

glad to know i'm not the only person to use JB WELD for cost effective pc repairs

 

get new hinges... i have some from a turion dv6000

 

So, how's the repair holding?

I'm going to attempt something similar. Though first I'm going to do a basic torque test between jb weld, oatey epoxy putty and plumbers putty (not expecting much from that one), and if I can get some, lab metal and/or quicksteel.

peace

 

Hey I dont know if this model is the same construction as the HP DV 9000. This repair worked for me ---> www.HingeFix.com <--- I only spent $12 on materials. It really is simple to do... After 8 days of constant testing it seems better than before. Im still deciding if Im gonna go back to step 13 and do the optional grinding so the case is completely shut. If you look at step 18 you'll see there is a small gap. Now that I have tested it for over a week I think the brace will be suffice if I grind off the that little bit more...

 

Holy cr@p, hingefix. Nice writeup but that is not for the faint of heart to try...