Is it possible to repair this?

[fish_aficionado]

Hi guys

This is an old cellphone: http://i.imgur.com/XISPr.jpg As you can see the ribbon is torn and the screen doesn't get any signal. I know it'd be better to buy another device but this one has some sentimental value attached to it.

Is this fixable? Thanks in advance.

 

[CocaCola]

Have you looked for replacement parts in Google or on Ebay? Unless the phone is some antique and or unpopular model you can generally find replacement flex cables like that, although you might be forced to purchase the entire board it's attached to if it's not double plugged...

You might even be able to source a 'close' flex circuit on Ebay or whatever and graft it to work as long as the lead spacing and shape are close enough...

And last but not least, have you looked for a junk phone on Ebay? Most phones devalue so quick that you can get a complete phone to gut for parts for chump change after a few years... I did this with an old Sanyo phone I had when I needed a new LCD, found a local seller on Ebay and picked it up in person for the $7 winning bid, and it came with a battery and charger that I benefited from...

 

[fish_aficionado]

That's a good deal you got there. Well so far I haven't found anything on ebay, must keep searching on google and probably visit some local stores. Also I guess it'd be better to find the board as I'm not a very clever guy and grafting a flex circuit may be a bit of a problem for me, still would give it a try though. As for the model, it's a Samsung SCH-8500, so I'd say it is somewhat unpopular.

Thanks for your help.

 

[CocaCola]

There is at least one on Ebay right now, not exactly cheap (but not stupid expensive either) as it's a 3 lot of phones... I suggest dropping the seller a message and seeing if they will sell just the 8500...

And in regards to Ebay, remember people are lazy and when it comes to low dollar items they just what to get rid of many times they won't bother figuring out exactly what it is... So don't just search for Samsung SCH-8500... Try searches like 'vintage flip phone' 'vintage samsung phone' 'samsung flip phone' and the list could go on, you might be surprised at just how many more you might find... And last but not least it's best to search for SCH 8500 without the - as some search engines will either drop it as a special character or exclude what immediately follow it because they use the minus sign as an exclusion prefix in their advance search options...

 

[fish_aficionado]

Somehow I didn't see that lot when searching on ebay, it's perfect, the price rises to almost 55$ with shipping so I'll ask him what you suggested. Also thanks for the searching tips, I had no idea about the minus sign rule.

 

[CocaCola]

The search exemption can be very handy, but like I said it's not always supported and in between two characters might break it...

But say for example you are searching Ebay for a used Xbox, but you want to filter out all the "red rign of death" aka non working ones, you could do a search like...

xbox -rrod -red -death

and that should filter out any listing that contains the 3 exempt words