How To Repair Damaged / Missing PCB Pads || 4 Great Methods 

Brilliant. I don't know why I never thought of transplanting a solder pad myself. Thanks for sharing your trade secrets... I will never fear losing a solder pad again!

As an amateur i thank you very much i managed to solder my UM300 pedal potentiometers with the wire method you taught me!

Man, thank you so much for making this. I’ve had an old Marshall guitar amp kicking around for years because the ring around one of the input Jack contacts broke off. I never threw it out because I figured there was a way to fix it. Well now I know how, thanks to you, and I’m gonna give it a go tomorrow. Cheers from a new subscriber in New Jersey.

This is exactly what I have been looking for! Thanks for sharing your knowledge again! Love your channel.

All of the methods you've shown are great for vintage and modern electronics. Keeping the board looking nice and neat is the right way to repair a circuit board. You've got a New Subcriber !

I watched this video a while ago, and pulled it up again as reference; thanks. What I really wish for, though, is for someone to manufacture reasonably priced replacement through-hole pads, as the ones available online usually surpass the value of the hardware I'm trying to fix in the first place. It's still great to have several options to mend otherwise perfectly good hardware, though.

So grateful for this- exactly the problem I had to fix! Now I know what pads are and why I’ve had such a problem fixing them in the past. Went with the wire rings. Harder with flux cored solder, but I think it’s worked👍👍👍

Your videos have helped me out tremendously, but I swear you are a magician and hope my work can one day get to 50% of what you are able to conjure up. Thank you!

Thank you very much for showing me/us how to do a proper fix on pads!

First joint was amazing the way it just flowed in. Nice work.

Fantastic. I have a pinball circuit board with missing pads. This was the first video that came up in the search and lucky for me. thanks for a very straightforward method.

Just great!. Since i found this channel all my work has become easier. Thank you so much.

WOW! Well done, excellent job!! 😀

You have made this look very easy! Thanks for the great video.

Chipping off the donut caused physical pain to myself but I couldn't turn away. Rip sacrificial donut.

You make it look so easy, great video

Excellent. You are great at this!

It worked perfectly, thank you and greetings from Chile.

Thank you! I thought my PCB was doomed but I was able to fix it with the first method

Wonderful vid. #2 was a huge help!!!

Wow so good to watch, I have an amp that has pcb with missing pads. I’ll give this a try!

Thanks for the video, there not enough people taking time to fix broken traces but for an expensive keeb that I broke a barreling on the trace I’m going to try method 2 seems like a great idea

Excellent job!

Awesome videos! I’m going to definitely try this to fix my mortal kombat sound board! Keep up the good work 👍

Wow! What an awesome board repair video! If anyone appreciates this or actually uses this to help with your own repiar, make sure to support awesome people like this, by completely watching the ad vids. That way the poster makes a little money off the ads. Thanks again for this great teaching video. 👍 Edit - I also subscribed 😁👍

Excellent job, thanks for sharing.

You are amazing. Thank you so much for making these videos.

Awesome information mate thank you

Thanks for making this! Trying to create a tape delay guitar rack using a cassette tape player and the contact to the motor fell off on soldering in a potentiometer for speed and pitch control

Very nice work, that gave me some ideas for some boards!

Thanks, very useful for me because I made a lot of PCB damage

Very cool tips. I'm going through all your videos, lots of good tips. You got another subscriber. Thanks for taking the time and sharing! When you perform the first 2 tips on this video, are they also electrically connected (solder inside the barrel)? I know it is a silly question (I know that mechanically it is secured), the question is connected to the situation I describe below. I've learned how to perform soldering in the last 2 years, mostly to recap old eletronics and get them back into working conditions. I've done that to 2 Xbox Classic (mainboards and power supplies), 2 Apple IIe power supplies, an APC Nobreak Mainboard and some Retro PC motherboards - 2 of them recently (ABIT and Epox brands). I normally add new solder on the old capacitors before removing them, tried 2 different ways: a big blob of solder, then heat both terminals at the same time, pull the old capacitor and later remove the old solder (with a Hakko Desoldering Pump) or adding solder and just suck all solder with the Hakko pump. On these 2 PCs, I had issues on roughly 10-15% while soldering new capacitors (PTH) : the solder won't stick to the PCB pad (circular). I'm using good quality flux and solder (63/37), and have no idea why this happens. The pad is still there, I cannot see a mechanical damage - I can only suppose the superficial layer is gone and there is nothing for the solder to adhere. I've been luck so far as there are other solder point nearby (I've always checked that they are connected), I got around it but soldering a jumper to them. It worked in all cases, but I'm afraid at some point there will be a case when I don't have this possibility. Would the first 2 tips you have shown us be an alternative to this situation? On the situation I've described above, I tried to flow solder into the barrel and even so, everything was moving afterwards by just touching it - so no solder adherence to the barrel.

lovely and enlightening video. ❤👍

The quality and clarity of your videos is unmatched and has massively improved the quality of my own repairs! Would you be able to show us a good method for entire barrel repairs please?

Awesome man! Thanks a bunch for showing us how to do a good job repairing pads. I haven't had to do this yet and always wondered how a replacement pad would actually stick to the pcb. My major problem is seeing what I'm doing. I really need to buy one of those microscopes with the LCD screen. 🥂

Thank you for this video! For the wire you are using, what is it called? Like if I’m ordering on Amazon or getting in micro center, what am I looking for? I’m just starting out with soldering and I’m fixing an Xbox c series controller. I’m completely replacing the mechanical joycons. While removing the old ones I damaged the pads and a barrel, so trying to fix that now. Also buying new barrels.

Keep up the good work man

I work a lot with 50s-70s PCBs that are so fragile and worn that attempting any part replacement usually leads to lifted pads and traces no matter how careful I am. I have always resorted to atrocious looking bodge wires all over the place to resolve it, but have been searching for better alternatives for more proper repair. This video is great. I know some have used tiny eyelets on old PCBs successfully, obtaining them of proper size can be pretty tricky or expensive though. I have wondered how effective the "conductive pens" are at redrawing torn traces on PCBs.

Awesome. Thanks for sharing.

This is what I have been looking for thanks for sharing❤🎉

This is brilliant! I foresee a couple more LEDs working on my pedalboaed! Thanks a ton for sharing what has undoubtedly cost you time and monry to learn.

Awesome video, you’re so good at soldering. I have a question? I have some pads that are damaged, I dropped flux on them and tried to apply solder to them, but the solder will not flow to the flux. It doesn’t work at all, it just stays stuck to the iron. Any advice?

Wow, u make it look so easy

You can't beat being in Blighty doing a bit of soldering whilst it's pissing down with rain 😁 As Dell boy would say very cushty work

Great presentation.

I think I saw this before.. the new music reminds me of REWA. Great videos!

Great illustration of a most technical electrical repair. Its a pity customers don't see first hand, the ingenuous technicality skill of it. Cheers..

Enjoyed watching you dexterity and skill great hand eye coordination

Great video! Could you tell us exactly what flux you are using?

Great stuff you got there mate! You gained a like and a subscriber!:)

Is is great but can you please do a repair video demonstrating on if you’ve got a missing barrel? Thanks

Cool video, well done, thank you for sharing it with us :)

Fantastic, Thanks for getting me out of a jam

Great video, thanks for sharing. I'd be interested to know how to proceed in case the barrel is missing/pulled.

Excellent video. I was replacing a Xbox controller joystick and thankfully the pad I burnt off was just for holding.

Good job 👏

Thanks for the video as I'm trying to fix a poor de-soldering job I did as a beginner. One quick question re: top right and bottom right pads: Do they electrically connect to a trace somewhere? I heard you say make sure not to bridge across that darker green outside ring. Are you recreating those pads for more integrity to hold the component in only? Just trying to get my head around circuit board design.

You said you want that space between the transplanted pad and pin, but how do you keep the resistor/pins so steady when transplanting the pad? What's holding your board/ resistor pins? Thank you for the video and your time!

This video is amazing! Is there a certain size wire to use for the first option?

very good camera work

Great vid, learned a lot. I usually run a soft wire around the pin and make it connect with the trace I scratched to expose the copper.

Absolutely fantastic video very interesting and informative indeed thanks for sharing your methods new sub here

awesome!

Fantastic! Hey I’m not really using flux in my basic pcb projects. Do you use it when you are initially soldering or just when you are realising like this. Also, I note that you ‘prelode’ the iron with solder. Do you always solder like that? Thanks!!!

nice one!

Brilliant.

Great video. What do you use to clean the board so nicely? What is the white material you clean with?

Back in the day PACE used to supply replacement track and pads. We did however use epoxy to fix the pads down. Not sure if you can buy them today as PCBs are much cheaper.

Thx great Video😍

Thank you

Great video! Excellent job! How the new pads from methods 1 and 4 stick in the PCB? I know the pads stick to the pins by the solder, but how the pads / pins will stick to the PCB? Thanks!

Absolutely fascinating! Brain surgery looks easy after that. May I ask what camera / microscope you use? Please don't be too long making further videos, I'm hooked! Many thanks.

To keep rework time to a minimum I have been using the "wire pad" method to repair damaged or missing pad eyes. I use non-tarnish silver coated artistic wire available through such places as Amazon.

In the first part of the video what type of wire do you use ? Just any awg resistor lead ? I messed up some pads lol

When working on vintage electronics it's very easy to rip pads sadly. One of the ways I "fixed" a lifted pad that went to ground was to bend the lead of the new component and solder it to a nearby pad that served as the connection to ground for a capacitor. Would this affect the capacitor or circuit in general?

Great video this is really helpful, can i ask what flux you are using and how it is packaged? Also what are you using to apply it, couldn’t quite make out what that was? 👍

And how does Conductive Paste work in these cases, and did you make the pads with wire or solder tin?

Is there a way I can contact you and send you an image because I damaged my controller when soldering it and one if the pin holes got damaged similar to how yours are where they lost the green masking and not being able to stick to the solder

yup,work for me if it big pcb for some micro pcb ill buy new or used

Hey Mr SolderFix, desperately need your help. I tried repairing a wired-control for an adjustable bed, totally bodged it up (not a pretty sight), but it did work for about 6 months. Now, two out of six wires have detached, the other four wires look a bit flaky, and the veins/channels/arteries on the circuit board look slightly damaged. Can I send you a photo of the circuit board and wire connections? Thanks in advance!

What size wire did you use for method #1?

Nice video, what microscope camera you use ?

Awesome

Would soldering some copper wire around the through hole trace work too?

I have damaged 2 pads on a pcb that an eeprom sat on i removed,how do i replace the pads??I take it they will have to be glued on as there isn't a pin/leg to keep it there on the board??Thanks.

I fried some pads trying to remove old solder from them. Will either of the first 2 methods work for something like that? Or am I out of luck. I am a complete beginner by the way. it looks like the pads on your board, before fixing them, look a lot better than what I am dealing with. Thanks in advance.

What kind of wire would I need if I wanted to attempt the first method?

Do you not glue or something else to stick the pads down?

Hi Sir. I have try to take out capacitor from pcb. Its come out with copper around one of its leg. Can i fix the pad hole by put back the copper? And may i know what im doing wrong that cause the copper pull out together?

What material is the wire you use? Thank you very much for the great contribution.

I definitely learned some things here. Having said that, as an absolute beginner, I would’ve appreciated a little more explanation and demonstration.

Would you be interested in repairing a circuit board for a Claas Combine? I have a bad pin at the bottom that renders the entire combine useless. The board is expensive and I think it could be repaired.

do you think these methods would work for a smaller component like a resistor?

I'm grateful because I think I'm maybe half-way closer to filling in some gaps in my knowledge after watching this. I watch so many repair videos and they always talk about "lifting pads" but this is the first time I've actually seen one up close. However I'm still confused as to what a "pad" is, because in the original setup, before any repairs, it seems like all the exposed areas are still bare metal, and the pads and traces are being added on top of that metal. If that's true, and there's already metal in place to conduct the electricity around the board, then what are the pads for? An extra layer on top of the PCB copper? Something that wicks solder more easily? Basically I'm still confused as to why the metal within the PCB isn't enough, and why a missing/broken pad means a loss of connectivity, when it seems like you could simply solder to the metal that's already under the pad.

Hi sir.. i broke the pads but my pads had barrels as well..those connected to lower and lowers conected with uper side of pcb .. so can u tell me what should i do now.. how i make barrels? And contact with pads? Thxs

Hello! This was a great video. I was wondering for the first method where can I get that wire from or what is it called?

Wonderful video !! Please tell me the type of flux you're using and where to buy it. I'm only familiar with paste flux. Thanks so much.

Man ur an artist in ur field .. seriously I learned a lot from ur videos .. great job! ... if I solder (I do it for a hobby) my hands shake and I can't see where I'm going (old man here) .. haha

I notice through your posts you are using a liquid based flux. What type and/brand do you prefer to use for most of these pcb/component fixes?

Cool video. But my problem is not in this vid unfortunately. My pcb lost the whole barrel with the pads. Will any of these methods be able to fix it? Cheers