Some years ago I was looking for a cordless mouse. The mouse cable was becoming an annoying thing... But I didn't want to change the mouse's batteries every month.
Then a new model came out: the Logitech LX6 Cordless Mouse, and it was reported to have 6 months of battery life.
So the Logitech LX6 became my first cordless mouse, and I've been very happy with it.
I must admit that after the LX6 I've been totally sold on Logitech Cordless mice, so now I own: the Logitech LX6 (used by my wife), the Logitech M705 'Marathon mouse' (on my main PC), the Logitech MX Revolution (at office), ad the Logitech V550 Nano Cordless Laser (on my netbook).
Now, after may years of happy clicking, the right button of the LX6 started behaving weirdly.
I know it can happen: the switch under mouse button can break/wear out, and suddenly your mouse start to triple/quadruple-clicking anything you are staring at.
Exactly for this reason I have a box with some broken mice: so that I can reuse their switches to fix my mouses :-)
Normally this is just a matter of desoldering the old switch, and soldering a new one.
But with the LX6, the first relevant thing to do was embarking in the (not so) easy process of taking it apart.
So here I'll show you some photos of the LX6 interior, and what you need to do to take it fully apart.
My Logithech LX6
The first 2 screws to remove are under the mouse feet.
The other 2 screws are inside the battery holder.
Now the LX6 is opened, but there is still much to do before you can remove the main circuit board.
Here is a shot of the broken switch.
And here is the "actuator" of the broken switch, it's the piece of plastic under the mouse button.
Even this plastic was a bit worn, so I tried to "fix" it with some drop of glue. But as it turned out, it wasn't this worn plastic causing the problem, but the underlying switch.
After detaching the connector, you are left with 2 mouse pieces, and the main board still firmly locked in it's place.
Guess wath? there is another screw that hold the mouse scroll wheel.
After removing this screw, we can take a look at the scroll wheel.
But the main board, is still locked.
At this point, I noticed the the battery holder is a separate piece of plastic, let's get rid of it.
There is a clip that hold the battery holder. A tiny screwdriver is enough to unclip it.
Remember to detach the battery connector before unclipping the battery holder.
And then, after unclipping the battery holder...
...it will slide out of its, ehm, holder.
And now we can look at the LX6 battery holder in all it's majesty :-)
Finally, we will be able to remove the main board.
Just unclip the IR Led, detach the flat cable of the IR sensor, and the main board will finally come out.
And we are left with a near empy bottom mouse plastic shell.
I like the simple way Logitech engineered the 2 buttons under the mouse.
Anyway, we finally can look at the main board of the mouse.
And here is the soldered joint of the culprit that made this mouse quadruple-click anything.
Here, near the broken switch, there is the replacement: the red switch, directly from my box of broken mice.
When I need to use the solderer, I remember why I decided to get a degree in Information Technology instead that Electronics :-)
Anyway, I'm glad I also studied Electronics, at least I know how to build ant fix electronics things ! :-)
Now the plan is easy:
1) desolder the broken switch from LX6 board.
1.1) don't break the main board
2) desolder the working red switch from the broken mouse
3) solder the working switch on LX6 main board
Desoldering is hard, especially if you need to desolder things hat are soldered on both side of the board.
After about 60 minutes of fiddling with solderer, tin sucker, and a copper wire used as a tin sponge/sucker... I've been able to remove the broken switch, and now I have a pretty clean (and luckly still intact) main board :-)
Desoldering the working switch from the broken mouse is easier, because "saving the board" isn't included in the plan :-)
The last part of the plan, soldering the working switch on the LX6 board, is just a matter of seconds!
And here we have it, the working switch now soldered on the LX6 board!
P.S.: no working mice were harmed in the making of this post :-)