Motorola Droid disassembly

Taking things apart is fun...especially when it was expensive, has been replaced, is out of warranty, and needs fixing. So my boss handed me his recently bathed Droid to take apart, rinse out with ethyl alcohol, and reassemble. A brief Google search found these two links:

Dr. Wreck's Motorola Droid teardown
Note commenter Jeremy on the second page of comments.

Dr. Wreck's analysis of the carnage


These are nearly comprehensive and very impressive. However, I would like to insert an omission or two.

When pulling the back cover off, there is a black flat piece that runs along the top (camera end) of the battery compartment that needs to be pulled down as it has two tabs around the first silver torx' socket's base.

Note that the mic will lift right out.

The antenna board seems to be glued in, but it doesn't seem to interfere with removing the edge cover so I didn't remove it during disassembly.

Keep track of the three buttons: I nearly lost one to the floor. One doesn't come out until you remove the edge connector.

This phone has a sticker under the battery that holds a significant part of the edge cover down. Peel this back, lift the screen-ward edge in the direction of the back of the phone and the opposite edge will disengage towards the front of the phone.

The screen mount has NINE (9) screws holding it in. Five you can see with the phone open and four you can only get to with the edge cover off. I am presently having incredibly amounts difficulty getting the center right keyboard edge one to come out. Judging by their use of glue in holding the edge connector on, it has probably been loc-tite'd into place so it's brutally obvious to a trained service tech when I have invaded the inner sancta of the phone... EDIT later today: every device has failed to break the screw loose, so I had to drill out the head.

Also keep track of the various rubber buffer pieces on the main board. In my considered opinion and lack of specific experience, they can hide water damage and are essential to vibration protection.

UPDATE: Even with two separate water damaged Droids, no combination was successful in restoring life. Luckily, my boss' Droid was still able to recognize a USB connection and dump anything useful onto his PC.