I have an Arduino Mega and one of the capacitors is broken off. It's the same as the one still attached (47, 25V, RVI) and the capacitor should be placed at location PC2.
I think this is SMD technique, anyway. My soldering skills are not high, I was wondering if I can solder it… since if it's positions at the right location I cannot put my soldering iron to it anymore, also since I don't think I can make the solder overlap the lines coming from the capacitor.
If not possible, would it be an idea to carefully try to solder two wires on the Mega at the connector points of PC2 and use 2 wires which I solder against the capacitor and put the capacitor somewhere else?
Update:
Does anybody know what would be the consequence to leave the capacitor out completely (like now)? (I did not dare to turn the Arduino Mega on because of the broken capacitor).
Best Answer
Yes, this is solderable. It is not difficult.
You need a soldering iron with a small point, and you need fine solder. I use 0.5 mm solder for just about everything.
Use solder wick to clean both pads and make them nice and flat.
Use your iron to heat one pad, and melt some solder on that pad.
Place the capacitor so the it sits properly. Pay attention to the polarity. This is an electrolytic capacitor. If you connect it backwards it will not work correctly.
Hold the capacitor in place with a pair of tweezers. Just push down on the top of the capacitor with the tweezers. This will keep it in place.
Heat the pad that you put solder on. It will melt, and the capacitor will pop down onto the pad - you can actually feel a "snap" through the tweezers when the capacitor seats.
Remove the iron. Let the solder cool. Remove the tweezers.
Apply the iron to the junction of the pad and pin on the unsoldered pin. Heat them both.
Apply solder to the heated pad and pin. It will melt and flow to cover both.
Remove the solder, them remove the iron.
Let cool, then resolder the first pad. The first pad wasn't soldered well because there wasn't enough flux on it. Heat the junction with the iron until the solder melts. Apply solder to the junction. Remove the solder, remove the iron, let cool.
Finished.
This method can be applied to any SMD part with two pads. More pads can be done just as easily, but you have pay more attention to the alignment.
Had a closer look at the picture. There is a piece of copper stuck to one pin of the capacitor, and a torn place on one of the pads.
You'll have to remove the scrap of copper from the capacitor.
You can solder it back in, no problem. The rest of the pad appears to still be connected to the ground plane, so when you solder the capacitor to what is left of the pad you will still have a good connection to ground for it.