PlayStation 3 Reflow

[Lord Diddy]

Well im sure some of you know of the "Yellow Light of Death" that occurs on the playstation (along with xbox) where the system stops working because of overheating. This is a rather long post to help organize what advice I'm looking for. Asking in 2011 I was hoping there would be new light on this subject and finding the most efficient method for this.

 

 

The European Union, a political and economic union of 27 countries, banned the importation of electronics containing lead in 2006, which has caused most electronics manufactures to switch to lead free solder in their products, even those sold in the U.S. (thanks to Entropy512 for the information). Unfortunately lead free solder has two (theorized) weaknesses. The first is that with repeated, high temperature (higher than what Sony engineers intended) exposure caused by 8 hour Call of Duty marathons or similar, followed by rapid cooling of the console once turned off, the balls begin to lose their elasticity, and eventually crack. This causes an open circuit, and when you try and power the PS3 up again, you are greeted with the YLOD. The other theory is that over time, due to the aforementioned high temperatures, the balls begin to grow "tin whiskers" which cause a short with another ball nearby, once again causing the YLOD.

 

Currently there are two methods that I've read that can reflow these chips and let the PS3 last for a month or two at best. But there have been people who have achieved almost a year, possibly because of low usage or careful heat consideration while in use or more importantly managed to do a higher quality reflow.

 

 

[Hide= Method 1 *Heat Gun Reflow (Gilksy Method)*] Using a Heat Gun on a specific thermal setting to (hopefully) reach the melting point of the solder and achieve a reflow

 

[/hide]

 

[hide= Method 2 *Oven Reflow*]

Taken from http://www.instructables.com/id/How-to-fix-a-YLOD-PS3-with-an-oven/step6/Reflowing/

 

So here's a quick run through of the profile: the board goes in the oven cold, and is kept in while the oven approaches the reflow temperature. This ensures the board is the same temperature everywhere (because the oven heats up slowly, giving the heat enough time to penetrate and soak all areas). As the reflow temperature is reached and surpassed, the solder melts. Once the correct temperature above the solder melting point is reached, the door is opened and a fan is used to gently draw hot air away from the face of the oven, which shortens the time the solder is liquid by speeding its cool-down.

 

THE ACTUAL STEPS:

 

Well, the time has finally come. Place the PS3 board on a counter top like you did when you prepped it for the low temp bake and check to make sure it is level. Then, put it on a pizza tray.

 

Put the motherboard in on the middle rack, towards the front of your oven. Place the thermometer you hopefully purchased in the oven, where you can see it through the door. Turn the temperature up to 500 degrees Fahrenheit. Relax. The oven will not reach this temperature. Take a seat on the floor and watch the thermometer. Once the needle rolls to approximately 460F, turn off the oven an throw open the door. The thermometer will rise a few degrees before it falls. Do not panic.

 

Take a box fan, osculating fan (set to not osculate), or similar, put it on its lowest setting, and place it OUTSIDE THE EDGE OF THE OVEN DOOR TO THE LEFT OR RIGHT, NOT DIRECTLY IN FRONT, WITH THE FAN BLOWING AIR AWAY FROM, I REPEAT, AWAY FROM THE OVEN, AND NOT NOT NOT INTO IT. The idea here is the pull hot air from the face of the oven, without creating any significant disturbance to the motherboard within. This will speed up the cool down, as explained in the theory. Once the board is close to room temp, feel free to remove it.

 

[/hide]

 

Question

Obviously going to use No-clean Flux, that's just soldering 101. Now I'm more of a fan of using the heat gun method, but it would be a more higher risk approach with a higher possibility of a quality reflow to use the oven method. Any thoughts, ideas, advice, or recommendation to guides on this idea? Also general soldering tips will be greatly helpful. I'm more than confident in my ability to DO a reflow, but I'm looking for more than just having it work for 2 weeks.

 

*Using Arctic silver for thermal paste, will slightly modify the PS3 case with more air and extra fans, and I'm in no position to attempt reballing on my own.

 

Thanks.