Accidentally bridged three pins on a board last week and it still worked

I was replacing a capacitor on an old Sony receiver from 1988 and my iron slipped. Ended up bridging three legs of an IC with solder. Thought I ruined it so I powered it on anyway just to see what would happen. It somehow fired up and sounds fine. Has anyone else had a repair go wrong but still come out working?

3 comments

3 Comments

grace_campbell21d ago

Oh man, I did almost the exact same thing with an old Kenwood amp from the 80s. I was swapping out some leaky caps near the power supply and my iron slipped and bridged two holes on the board with a blob of solder. I was sure I fried something, but after cleaning it up and reflowing it, the thing fired right up and sounds just fine. That vintage gear must be built tough, because I've had a few other close calls too where I thought I wrecked a trace and it somehow still works perfect. Sometimes you just get lucky, and it's the best feeling when it pays off.

ryantorres21d ago

Lucky for you guys. I've seen vintage gear where a slip like that lifted a trace completely and the whole board was toast. Those old single-sided boards aren't indestructible, they're just old and brittle. @emma_dixon70 I bet that cat cost someone a whole receiver somewhere. Sometimes it's not "built tough" it's just that the circuit is simple enough to survive a minor bridge, but you're rolling the dice every time. I'd rather spend the extra time with kapton tape and a steady hand than rely on luck.

emma_dixon7021d ago

The same thing happened to me but with a 70s Pioneer receiver. My cat actually jumped on the table while I was desoldering a bad resistor and I yanked the iron across three pads. Cleaned it up with some wick and it works fine. These units were really overbuilt back then.