2 years ago i wanted to delid my 4770k and put liquid metal inside. yea i delided but i was so scared of liquid metal migrating i didn't use the metal in the end and just put new thermal paste inside. and well i'm thinking it was a good call. the pc is still working great. i still put nail polish on sensitive contacts just in case of need.
I'm a chemist. The liquid metal isn't attracted to the isopropyl alcohol, it hates it. That's why it bunches up into a sphere to have the smallest amount of surface area touching the IPA. It sticks to the swab because it's slightly more attracted to the cotton than the IPA.
@@deepwidedarklightmercury in such vast quantities is banned in consumer electronics. RoHS allows up to 1000 ppm within "liquid metal". It's mostly gallium and indium, but also contains tin, zinc and other stuff.
@@ibrahimmardini7784 Also applied very precisely by machine (or human with proper tools and training) on boards that cost substantially less than the retail price of a gaming laptop. Manufacturers can absorb the cost of a few scrapped boards - it's built into their price. The risk is much greater for consumers and for most it's just not worth it.
@@ibrahimmardini7784 There have been Reddit posts of PS5s dying due to the liquid metal leaking past the sponge barrier, shorting out components. However they were all consoles that were kept in a vertical orientation.
Phase Change Material on the CPU/GPU core and Thermal Putty on the VRAM, VRM's, and Coils is the way to go. Putty gives you better chance of getting a super thin layer of Phase Change on the CPU and GPU die.
I'm surprised no one has come up with a vacuum system to pull liquid metal spills such as this mess. A catch bottle with an aquarium pump; attaching to the vacuum side of the pump might work. 🤔
MX4 is pretty much worthless on a high end laptop, you'll get at least 10-15 degrees better with liquid metal, not to mention mx4 gets worse really fast cause of the high temps on laptops.
Directions for use: Locate the air vents for your laptop, position laptop so those vents face up. Pour the entire contents of this container into the vents to drastically improve your laptop's temps! Yeah dude!
I can never understand why people even attempt this on a mobile device that you can carry around. You are basically asking for the liquid metal to spill around everywhere.
@@Misimpathis. You don’t need much to go a long way when applying it. Literally just a little tiny almost pinpoint amount. When applied properly the surface tension is such that it’s not going anywhere even in a laptop that’s carried around, and you can also apply clear nail polish on the components around the cpu/gpu if you really want to be extra careful On my msi laptop I saw incredible thermal performance gains after LM. But I also watched videos and learned how to do it properly lol. This looks like they used almost the whole syringe full of it
From ChatGPT Isopropyl alcohol (IPA) beads up liquid metal, particularly gallium-based alloys, due to the combination of surface tension effects and the interfacial interactions between the liquid metal and the IPA. Here's a breakdown of why this happens: ### 1. **Surface Tension of Liquid Metal:** - Liquid metals like gallium have high surface tension, which makes them naturally form spherical droplets or beads. This strong cohesive force within the liquid metal resists spreading out and causes it to form beads when placed on a surface. ### 2. **Poor Wetting with IPA:** - Wetting refers to the ability of a liquid to spread out on a surface. For a liquid to spread, it must have a strong adhesive interaction with the surface. However, isopropyl alcohol doesn't wet liquid metals well due to the difference in polarity and surface energy between IPA and the liquid metal. As a result, IPA cannot spread easily over the surface of the liquid metal and instead forms beads. ### 3. **Incompatibility of Surface Energies:** - The surface energy of isopropyl alcohol is much lower than that of liquid metals. When IPA comes into contact with liquid metal, it minimizes its contact area due to the difference in surface energies. This leads to the beading effect. ### 4. **Oxide Layer on Liquid Metal:** - Many liquid metals, such as gallium, form a thin oxide layer on their surface when exposed to air. This oxide layer further increases the surface tension and reduces the ability of IPA to wet the surface, contributing to the beading effect. ### 5. **Hydrophobicity:** - In some cases, the surface properties of the liquid metal, especially if it has been treated or has oxidized, may behave in a way that is hydrophobic or repellent to polar solvents like IPA. This would cause IPA to bead up even more dramatically. In summary, the beading up of liquid metal when exposed to isopropyl alcohol is primarily due to the high surface tension of the metal, poor wetting properties of IPA on the metal, and the presence of a possible oxide layer. By the way... You missed a spot....
I am Miner since a long time and read a lot about LM over my lifetime. I used it this year after all the other learnings i made about Hardware... What should i say?! Do never use LM. :-) From the four cards just one hit the goal. 200 Watt heavy power draw with under 70 Celsius is insane. But it is not worth it for the risk to demage absolut everything. All my other cards went down over the time. It does not the magic behind this metal. I do not think about a minute to add LM on my brand new Laptop. But with the look on the choose one who works.... ARGH :-)
@@lemagreengreen Yes, it's from the factory with liquid metal, I think it should have been on both cpu and gpu, and there should also have been a barrier, there's only a small piece of it left in the video
This is what we call... "The DISASTROUS amount of Liquid Metal." Even though it's in PS4 and PS5, I'd never trust it on something like laptops. The risk of shorting is like the sword of Damocles hanging on the user.
I know it is not practical, but in theory a little higher temp would made liquid metal more liquid, but you would also need to put a hot mb into a freakin' centrifuge with high rpm to spin it out under those chips...
Not going to work. You have to trace every tiny bit of it and reball every bga ic with liquid metal under it. Still, a cpu with liquid metal under it is most likely dead.
As I'm watching you pool up that liquid metal I was thinking of a Shop-Vac to vacuum it all up off the board rather than trying to pick it up with tweezers.
@Northridgefix I've watched your excellent work for years and enjoy your videos. Your worldview and customer care is very accurate and your work is very precise. Keep up the good work 💪
Seems that the liquid metal does not like to be in contact with a surface which is covered with IPA. It is energeticly better to form a sphere of metal with minimal surface. Similar to a drop of water in a teflon pan.
I think alcohol acts in a way similar to solder flux with solder. It goes between the liquid metal and the surfaces it's contaminated and it makes it form into a ball because the surface tension of alcohol is much lower than that of the liquid metal. Allows a low friction environment that then makes the surface tension of the metal to form it into a ball. About the laptop not powering on at all: my guess is that one of the shorts due to the liquid metal blew up a fuse on the board. Maybe one going to the voltage converters for the processor or whatnot. If the processor doesn't get all of it's needed voltages it doesn't power on, and there are no signs of life anywhere else because the processor needs to enable everything else to power on.
Isopropyl does indeed cause the metal to congeal into a larger mass, it's one of the ways that potassium and sodium metals are cleaned. The alcohol lowers the surface tension on contact. Also, you missed a spot.
2 years ago i wanted to delid my 4770k and put liquid metal inside. yea i delided but i was so scared of liquid metal migrating i didn't use the metal in the end and just put new thermal paste inside. and well i'm thinking it was a good call. the pc is still working great. i still put nail polish on sensitive contacts just in case of need.
Hint from an expert. Clean liquid metal with WD40, it is crazy how good it works. Just clean up the WD40 residue with alcohol or if it's on the floor or table, Windex work great. Anything that cuts grease and oil.
This is a perfect example of why you should not apply it directly to cpu/gpu die rather small amount as far away from laptop to a Cotton swab tip and rub that in onto die real good untill it sticks and then same on COPPER cooler( do not try with aluminium heatsink) it will destroy it completely. Benefits are nothing to scuff at . Lower temps also means quieter laptop and higher sustained clocks. Mixed with undervolting it's day and night difference in acoustics,temps and battery life and there are performance gains as well not to mention longer life for whole laptop... This is not for for anyone but done with outmost caution, bit of knowledge and not rushed results are amazing. ( One more thing that really who mentions is that.. after first application you need to add bit more after week or so because it gets absorbed by copper heatsink) if it's nickel plated there is no need for this step.
It's an animal like the T1000 Terminator, when soldering under current. It has a behaviour. It's better to ban liquid metal paste, and use another type that doesn't have a behaviour.
I was interesting to see how ipa made the liquid metal form into balls, would it be easier at that stage to use a solder sucker to lift it off the board. I realise that might not be a complete solution by any means but interim as one works around the board. just a thought.
Hi, I was wondering why you don’t use an ultrasonic cleaner where the cleaning of the motherboard is faster and more precise. And if you want to be more thorough, you can clean it manually afterwards.
. . . I'm going to guess that the Motherboard temperature is about 32 degrees, so may have 100 degrees; so there is a 68 degree temperature reduction from the liquid metal.
Liquid metals do not readily mix with isopropanol; they are immiscible. This immiscibility, combined with the higher surface tension of the metal, causes the liquid metal to minimize its contact with the isopropanol. As a result, the liquid metal forms rounded droplets or blobs, reducing the area of contact between the two substances.
Or the inherent ability of liquids to stick together creates surface tension. It would probably work as well with normal water, but thats not something you'd put on electronics.
We would use conductive paint in PC cash register service, and it was when: -the spare motherboard was damaged/scratched in transport -th mb was damaged by clumsy field tech. Damage repair was limited to scratched trace. It was long time ago, boards and traces were larger and quick test/repair was needed. I would never try to fix a trace on modern mainboard with it.
You have to jump start the board to start again. Pour 1oz of liquid metal over the components and plug it in, it will the distribute the power accross the board and getting it to start. Lol
If you know what you doing use liquid metal if not just get PTM7950 (similar to LM also becomes liquid but without a risk of shorting your components) and the risk of killing your laptop is GONE. Applied in MSI GT72S Dominator Pro G and temps of CPU i7 6820/GPU GTX980m reduced by at least 10C.
I don't know the properties of that (liquid) metal, but maybe a magnet could help to get the metal out from the board? A solder sucker should help, too.
A thought that pops into my head when you talk about ultra sonic cleaning and that doesn't work. What is if you put isopropyl alcohol in a small paintgun, and with (super clean) air pressure spray the thing off? Isopropyl alcohol acts as a transport medium for the liquid metal, so you can blow everything in between and behind the chips away?
I would only use LM on devices specifically designed for it. Had a friend use it after market on a full sized gaming tower PC, got a 10 degree temp difference, took it to a LAN party (yes, people still do that), and by the time he got there, that crap was everywhere and his PC wouldn't boot. Ended up replacing a $300 mobo.
Which type of alloy is liquid metal and what is it used for? When you touched it with the IPA it almost behaved like mercury O.O Do you use it to lower the melting temperature of another alloy like you use low melt solder?
It's just the temperature nothing else as alcohol naturally cools down the liquid metal it becomes more towards the solid end and can be picked up easily by swab or tweezers
where did you find 100ml liquid metal to put that much ? maybe you can try to pressurized isoalcohol or brake cleaner or curcuit cleaner if it is any left under the component
That level of liquid metal, I'd be pretty close to telling the customer it's a no go just because of how extensive it is. Table flipping levels! Needs lots of patience and several prayers hoping I'd get it all
Last question. Is there a specific alcohol you use? I usually try tonise 99% but sometimes get stuck with 91% and it's annoying having to wipe up the white residue afterwards.
i would say 100% i have learned something here a. use a cotton but plenty of cleaner b. dont use liquid metal if you dont have experience laying it, Thank you,
Great video, would compressed air be useful to move the liquid metal from under the BGA and out of tight speaces. Im sure you have probably tried or thought of this.
Liquid metal is basically a gallium, indium and tin compound with some additives depending on the individual manufacturers. So yes, this stuff is the same.
I wonder if would be easier to remove liquid metal by putting board in fridge. Not crazy negative temps but let say 10 C just to solidify metal and than scrape it away.
I wonder if liquid metal will react to a magnet 🧲. If you need strong magnets to make it work you can use what's called rare Earth magnets. Just a suggestion to try out.
I think it was better and faster to put the motherboard into the dishwasher with Cascade detergent soap. I know many people may laugh at my comment, but believe it or not, 25 years ago I used to work in a factory making Intel motherboards and the factory used a huge industrial dishwasher machine with Cascade detergent to wash the boards before going to inspection.
Wow, someone did not know what they were doing. Good thing they don't use aluminum to build motherboards. If you don't know what I am talking about, look up gallium vs. aluminum.
Asus rog strix scar 18 comes with liquid metal on cpu and gpu from the factory. And you can't replace it with thermal paste, because it won't work properly.
with proper care and precautions being taken , liquid metal can do wonders for your laptop , have been using liquid metal on my predator helios 300 i5 8th gen for like 5 years now and all is good
Never used liked metal myself only paste, good to know about this situation to avoid it. Btw would a magnet help on getting the liquid balls out? Unless is a "non magnetic" metal, like copper.
I added LM on four GPUs and just one is working with the expected goal. The other three got back to normal WP. I am a miner thins a long time. I know what i do. I say, do not use LM if you have anything to ask about. ;-)
I like your video;s so much. Im also an electronics repair guy as you are, but you are way more professional than me. and you have more equipment. But i still learn from you. Thanks
GPU and other component manufacturers love Liquid Metal. They love it because so many people will buy it for a minuscule increase in thermal conductivity and a portion of those people will ruin their components with it causing them to either buy a replacement component or pay an overpriced manufacturer repair when they try to RMA it. Glad they are keeping you in business though!
I had a Laptop come in with a cooked CPU due to a poor design by the manufacturer. They used Liquid Metal but never designed a way to keep the Liquid Metal on the chip die, so it ran everywhere, leaving nothing between the die and the heatsink. I first thought the client did it, then I thought for a second, wait, the seal was still intact. I won't name the manufacturer.
liquid metal reduces temps by 100% when your device no longer turns on 😂
damn it you beat me to it
💀
@@don4techy woosh
2 years ago i wanted to delid my 4770k and put liquid metal inside. yea i delided but i was so scared of liquid metal migrating i didn't use the metal in the end and just put new thermal paste inside. and well i'm thinking it was a good call. the pc is still working great. i still put nail polish on sensitive contacts just in case of need.
xD
I'm a chemist. The liquid metal isn't attracted to the isopropyl alcohol, it hates it. That's why it bunches up into a sphere to have the smallest amount of surface area touching the IPA. It sticks to the swab because it's slightly more attracted to the cotton than the IPA.
It needs to show us on the doll how much it hates IPA or it didn't happen
What is this liquid metal? mercury? or something else?
It's called a eutectic system which means it has a much lower melting point than any of the individual components.
@@deepwidedarklightmercury in such vast quantities is banned in consumer electronics. RoHS allows up to 1000 ppm within "liquid metal". It's mostly gallium and indium, but also contains tin, zinc and other stuff.
The most common element in Liquid Metal is Gallium. Combined with tin and indium it can be liquid down to about -19F.
Thanks for the video. Liquid metal doesn't seem worth the risk, especially not in a laptop that gets moved around.
Works best in mostly stationary electronics like the PS5 that also has a sponge barrier around the APU to prevent leakage
@@ibrahimmardini7784 Also applied very precisely by machine (or human with proper tools and training) on boards that cost substantially less than the retail price of a gaming laptop. Manufacturers can absorb the cost of a few scrapped boards - it's built into their price. The risk is much greater for consumers and for most it's just not worth it.
correct
@@ibrahimmardini7784the ps5 already comes with liquid metal, although from factory sometimes they apply too little, leaving some dry spots
@@ibrahimmardini7784 There have been Reddit posts of PS5s dying due to the liquid metal leaking past the sponge barrier, shorting out components. However they were all consoles that were kept in a vertical orientation.
Tech : How much did you put ?
Customer : Yes.
Customer: Only one full milliliter of Gallium. The syringe didn't have more so, I couldn't put more.
Costumer: the whole syringe by the looks of it 😂
All of it!
The customer is T-1000 from Terminator, and he is lying about how this damage happened.
😂
made my day
😨
That is what happens when T-1000 sneezes and does not cover his mouth.
Phase Change Material on the CPU/GPU core and Thermal Putty on the VRAM, VRM's, and Coils is the way to go. Putty gives you better chance of getting a super thin layer of Phase Change on the CPU and GPU die.
I'm surprised no one has come up with a vacuum system to pull liquid metal spills such as this mess.
A catch bottle with an aquarium pump; attaching to the vacuum side of the pump might work. 🤔
MX4 user for many years. Electrically non conductive, cheap, really good.
MX-6 is better though.
@@JynxedKoma MX-4 has the best durability MX-6 has the best thermal conductivity both have a purpose
they're the two i use most, always cheap AF in the large tubes.
Trying some of that "Honeywell" stuff at the weekend 🤞
MX4 is pretty much worthless on a high end laptop, you'll get at least 10-15 degrees better with liquid metal, not to mention mx4 gets worse really fast cause of the high temps on laptops.
I assembled my PC 12 years ago and used MX4, I haven't touched it ever since.
Directions for use:
Locate the air vents for your laptop, position laptop so those vents face up.
Pour the entire contents of this container into the vents to drastically improve your laptop's temps! Yeah dude!
You can't use a 4 inch paint brush to put liquid metal on 🤦♂️
Looked more like a spray and pray application
OMG! Spit take!
I can never understand why people even attempt this on a mobile device that you can carry around. You are basically asking for the liquid metal to spill around everywhere.
If you stupid it will lead to problems. If not stupid it will gain more thermal conductivity between cpu and heat sink. Intel cpu very hot.
@@Misimpathis. You don’t need much to go a long way when applying it. Literally just a little tiny almost pinpoint amount. When applied properly the surface tension is such that it’s not going anywhere even in a laptop that’s carried around, and you can also apply clear nail polish on the components around the cpu/gpu if you really want to be extra careful
On my msi laptop I saw incredible thermal performance gains after LM. But I also watched videos and learned how to do it properly lol. This looks like they used almost the whole syringe full of it
From ChatGPT
Isopropyl alcohol (IPA) beads up liquid metal, particularly gallium-based alloys, due to the combination of surface tension effects and the interfacial interactions between the liquid metal and the IPA. Here's a breakdown of why this happens:
### 1. **Surface Tension of Liquid Metal:**
- Liquid metals like gallium have high surface tension, which makes them naturally form spherical droplets or beads. This strong cohesive force within the liquid metal resists spreading out and causes it to form beads when placed on a surface.
### 2. **Poor Wetting with IPA:**
- Wetting refers to the ability of a liquid to spread out on a surface. For a liquid to spread, it must have a strong adhesive interaction with the surface. However, isopropyl alcohol doesn't wet liquid metals well due to the difference in polarity and surface energy between IPA and the liquid metal. As a result, IPA cannot spread easily over the surface of the liquid metal and instead forms beads.
### 3. **Incompatibility of Surface Energies:**
- The surface energy of isopropyl alcohol is much lower than that of liquid metals. When IPA comes into contact with liquid metal, it minimizes its contact area due to the difference in surface energies. This leads to the beading effect.
### 4. **Oxide Layer on Liquid Metal:**
- Many liquid metals, such as gallium, form a thin oxide layer on their surface when exposed to air. This oxide layer further increases the surface tension and reduces the ability of IPA to wet the surface, contributing to the beading effect.
### 5. **Hydrophobicity:**
- In some cases, the surface properties of the liquid metal, especially if it has been treated or has oxidized, may behave in a way that is hydrophobic or repellent to polar solvents like IPA. This would cause IPA to bead up even more dramatically.
In summary, the beading up of liquid metal when exposed to isopropyl alcohol is primarily due to the high surface tension of the metal, poor wetting properties of IPA on the metal, and the presence of a possible oxide layer.
By the way...
You missed a spot....
Did you read through that before you pasted it?
It's definitely staying cool now. Never gets switched on lol.
I have a Nitro 16 and the first thing I did was replace the liquid metal with MX-5. temps are similar...but the worry is gone.
I am Miner since a long time and read a lot about LM over my lifetime. I used it this year after all the other learnings i made about Hardware... What should i say?! Do never use LM. :-) From the four cards just one hit the goal. 200 Watt heavy power draw with under 70 Celsius is insane. But it is not worth it for the risk to demage absolut everything. All my other cards went down over the time. It does not the magic behind this metal. I do not think about a minute to add LM on my brand new Laptop. But with the look on the choose one who works.... ARGH :-)
It comes with LM stock?
Does it have any foam barrier or anything?
@@lemagreengreen Yes, it's from the factory with liquid metal, I think it should have been on both cpu and gpu, and there should also have been a barrier, there's only a small piece of it left in the video
would a solder sucker help in this?
WOW FIRST THING I HAD THOUGHT OF ALSO
If this laptop ends up no fix, it is absolutely not surprising and what the customer asked for.
bet lots of that junk got under the shields and under the chips.
scares me to think my laptop has liquid metal... whats wrong with non conductive thermal paste?
This is what we call... "The DISASTROUS amount of Liquid Metal."
Even though it's in PS4 and PS5, I'd never trust it on something like laptops. The risk of shorting is like the sword of Damocles hanging on the user.
Only the PS5 uses LM
Some manufacturers are starting to use it on there laptops. This guy just had no clue what he was doing.
The new Jackson Pollock laptop.
This laptop has Liquid Metal on the CPU stocked I service these all the time. But I think the customer added more than what it needed. 🤦🏽♀️
liquid metals are not attracted to isopropyl alcohol due to differences in surface tension, lack of polarity matching, and chemical incompatibility.
Possibly fixable but you have to look under these bga chips.
I know it is not practical, but in theory a little higher temp would made liquid metal more liquid, but you would also need to put a hot mb into a freakin' centrifuge with high rpm to spin it out under those chips...
Not going to work. You have to trace every tiny bit of it and reball every bga ic with liquid metal under it. Still, a cpu with liquid metal under it is most likely dead.
This guy had lots of liquid metal. Guess he applied it in amounts as if it was normal thermal paste.
As I'm watching you pool up that liquid metal I was thinking of a Shop-Vac to vacuum it all up off the board rather than trying to pick it up with tweezers.
Using a vacuum on the board could generate static electricity and fry capacitors and stuff.
@@disguisedbeastlol not really
I thought solder sucker
@@tbone-d2vthis
@Northridgefix I've watched your excellent work for years and enjoy your videos. Your worldview and customer care is very accurate and your work is very precise. Keep up the good work 💪
I usually wake up early to have coffee and I always look forward to seeing your videos. Today was nice to see a longer one, thank you.
Seems that the liquid metal does not like to be in contact with a surface which is covered with IPA. It is energeticly better to form a sphere of metal with minimal surface. Similar to a drop of water in a teflon pan.
I think alcohol acts in a way similar to solder flux with solder. It goes between the liquid metal and the surfaces it's contaminated and it makes it form into a ball because the surface tension of alcohol is much lower than that of the liquid metal. Allows a low friction environment that then makes the surface tension of the metal to form it into a ball.
About the laptop not powering on at all: my guess is that one of the shorts due to the liquid metal blew up a fuse on the board. Maybe one going to the voltage converters for the processor or whatnot. If the processor doesn't get all of it's needed voltages it doesn't power on, and there are no signs of life anywhere else because the processor needs to enable everything else to power on.
Looks like the T1000 spat on it :) Does solder sucker work well with liquid metal also?
Isopropyl does indeed cause the metal to congeal into a larger mass, it's one of the ways that potassium and sodium metals are cleaned. The alcohol lowers the surface tension on contact. Also, you missed a spot.
2 years ago i wanted to delid my 4770k and put liquid metal inside. yea i delided but i was so scared of liquid metal migrating i didn't use the metal in the end and just put new thermal paste inside. and well i'm thinking it was a good call. the pc is still working great. i still put nail polish on sensitive contacts just in case of need.
Hint from an expert. Clean liquid metal with WD40, it is crazy how good it works. Just clean up the WD40 residue with alcohol or if it's on the floor or table, Windex work great. Anything that cuts grease and oil.
Could you wick up liquid metal using less heat than the melting point of solder?
This is a perfect example of why you should not apply it directly to cpu/gpu die rather small amount as far away from laptop to a Cotton swab tip and rub that in onto die real good untill it sticks and then same on COPPER cooler( do not try with aluminium heatsink) it will destroy it completely.
Benefits are nothing to scuff at . Lower temps also means quieter laptop and higher sustained clocks. Mixed with undervolting it's day and night difference in acoustics,temps and battery life and there are performance gains as well not to mention longer life for whole laptop... This is not for for anyone but done with outmost caution, bit of knowledge and not rushed results are amazing.
( One more thing that really who mentions is that.. after first application you need to add bit more after week or so because it gets absorbed by copper heatsink) if it's nickel plated there is no need for this step.
It's an animal like the T1000 Terminator, when soldering under current. It has a behaviour. It's better to ban liquid metal paste, and use another type that doesn't have a behaviour.
"This does not look factory" - I damn well hope not :D
hello nice vids, just wanna ask, of all gaming laptop brands you have fixed. which brand broke or failed the most?
I was interesting to see how ipa made the liquid metal form into balls, would it be easier at that stage to use a solder sucker to lift it off the board. I realise that might not be a complete solution by any means but interim as one works around the board. just a thought.
This isn't just any liquid metal. This is an advanced prototype...a mimetic poly-alloy.
The customer clearly used too little liquid metal. A classic beginner's mistake.
Was he supposed to coat the entire Motherboard?
@@johnt.848 Yes, you need to submerge the entire board in liquid metal and sprinkel solder paste over it for optimal cooling.
Hi, I was wondering why you don’t use an ultrasonic cleaner where the cleaning of the motherboard is faster and more precise. And if you want to be more thorough, you can clean it manually afterwards.
I tried it once. on an old 1080 gtx. and then i learned. paste is maybe better in the future. ;)
PTM7950 is the way to go! and for the other components, just use soft performance pads like: Arctic TP-3
. . . I'm going to guess that the Motherboard temperature is about 32 degrees, so may have 100 degrees; so there is a 68 degree temperature reduction from the liquid metal.
Wow! Thanks for tips my friend! I haven’t had to deal with Liquid Metal as a technician just yet.
From where these liquid metal come on the mother board?
Liquid metals do not readily mix with isopropanol; they are immiscible. This immiscibility, combined with the higher surface tension of the metal, causes the liquid metal to minimize its contact with the isopropanol. As a result, the liquid metal forms rounded droplets or blobs, reducing the area of contact between the two substances.
What microscopic camera and setup are you using for these repairs? Thanks!
I think Alcohol is cooling down the liquid metal temp so it becomes easier to be formed in bubble and picked up
Or the inherent ability of liquids to stick together creates surface tension. It would probably work as well with normal water, but thats not something you'd put on electronics.
can we combine that with vacum cleaner? suck it out?
@@billykulim5202Solder sucker maybe
Moral of the story: Don't use liquid metal.
Nonsense. Just learn how to apply it correctly.
We would use conductive paint in PC cash register service, and it was when:
-the spare motherboard was damaged/scratched in transport
-th mb was damaged by clumsy field tech.
Damage repair was limited to scratched trace. It was long time ago, boards and traces were larger and quick test/repair was needed. I would never try to fix a trace on modern mainboard with it.
You have to jump start the board to start again. Pour 1oz of liquid metal over the components and plug it in, it will the distribute the power accross the board and getting it to start. Lol
IPA reduces the melting temperature so it becomes more solid. Use syringe with needle next time. Easier😊
Nice video, Try the ultrasonic with a big magnet beside the board, be interesting see if anything sticks
If you know what you doing use liquid metal if not just get PTM7950 (similar to LM also becomes liquid but without a risk of shorting your components) and the risk of killing your laptop is GONE. Applied in MSI GT72S Dominator Pro G and temps of CPU i7 6820/GPU GTX980m reduced by at least 10C.
This genius put so much liquid metal that the amount is enough for 10 applications.
I remember those days when I was young, agressive and I thought 5% was worth all of the risk and I knew without a doubt that "I can do this"....
I don't know the properties of that (liquid) metal, but maybe a magnet could help to get the metal out from the board?
A solder sucker should help, too.
A thought that pops into my head when you talk about ultra sonic cleaning and that doesn't work. What is if you put isopropyl alcohol in a small paintgun, and with (super clean) air pressure spray the thing off? Isopropyl alcohol acts as a transport medium for the liquid metal, so you can blow everything in between and behind the chips away?
It's possible that it has Ambient Light Sensor, so it doesn't power up without bottom case, or it's completely dead. Later being more probable.
I would only use LM on devices specifically designed for it.
Had a friend use it after market on a full sized gaming tower PC, got a 10 degree temp difference, took it to a LAN party (yes, people still do that), and by the time he got there, that crap was everywhere and his PC wouldn't boot. Ended up replacing a $300 mobo.
Which type of alloy is liquid metal and what is it used for? When you touched it with the IPA it almost behaved like mercury O.O Do you use it to lower the melting temperature of another alloy like you use low melt solder?
This means that the owner or whoever applied the LM had no idea what he was dealing with.
They used a whole tube of LM for a core. It's incredible.
Heat problems are best resolved during the board design phase. Don’t over stress the circuit.
Who puts Liquid metal on the circuits?
It's just the temperature nothing else as alcohol naturally cools down the liquid metal it becomes more towards the solid end and can be picked up easily by swab or tweezers
where did you find 100ml liquid metal to put that much ? maybe you can try to pressurized isoalcohol or brake cleaner or curcuit cleaner if it is any left under the component
Road map, left dead end, right you get to your home and it's burnt down.... Love your sense of humor!!!
1 gram of liquid metal should last about 5 laptops or more, and in the case of liquid metal and thermal paste, more is less.
That level of liquid metal, I'd be pretty close to telling the customer it's a no go just because of how extensive it is. Table flipping levels! Needs lots of patience and several prayers hoping I'd get it all
How would you evaluate the idea of cleaning a motherboard using distilled water applied with a manual water pump bottle at moderate pressure?
Last question. Is there a specific alcohol you use? I usually try tonise 99% but sometimes get stuck with 91% and it's annoying having to wipe up the white residue afterwards.
Anything over 90% is ok.
i would say 100% i have learned something here a. use a cotton but plenty of cleaner b. dont use liquid metal if you dont have experience laying it, Thank you,
Jesus... "How much liquid metal did you use fam?" "All of it"
Great video, would compressed air be useful to move the liquid metal from under the BGA and out of tight speaces. Im sure you have probably tried or thought of this.
Gallium turns aluminum into brittle junk immediately.
Is this stuff the same?
if so, be very careful.
Liquid metal is basically a gallium, indium and tin compound with some additives depending on the individual manufacturers. So yes, this stuff is the same.
I wonder if would be easier to remove liquid metal by putting board in fridge. Not crazy negative temps but let say 10 C just to solidify metal and than scrape it away.
I wonder if liquid metal will react to a magnet 🧲. If you need strong magnets to make it work you can use what's called rare Earth magnets. Just a suggestion to try out.
I'm just surprised you even bother trying to clean it up. It probably shorted many components already.
I think it was better and faster to put the motherboard into the dishwasher with Cascade detergent soap.
I know many people may laugh at my comment, but believe it or not, 25 years ago I used to work in a factory making Intel motherboards and the factory used a huge industrial dishwasher machine with Cascade detergent to wash the boards before going to inspection.
Wow, someone did not know what they were doing. Good thing they don't use aluminum to build motherboards. If you don't know what I am talking about, look up gallium vs. aluminum.
They wanted ultra low melt solder
Asus rog strix scar 18 comes with liquid metal on cpu and gpu from the factory. And you can't replace it with thermal paste, because it won't work properly.
wow what a disaster liquid metal,,,,,,,,, why,,,,,,,, if this ends up as a fix,,, thx for posting
If there is little bit liquid metal under chip, can you apply little bit of air pressure from one side of the chip to get some metal out?
with proper care and precautions being taken , liquid metal can do wonders for your laptop , have been using liquid metal on my predator helios 300 i5 8th gen for like 5 years now and all is good
If it is a fix, it will be long-term damage. Throw it away.
11:58 Why not do a long ultrasonic bath having the bord upside down and let gravity do the work?
Never used liked metal myself only paste, good to know about this situation to avoid it. Btw would a magnet help on getting the liquid balls out? Unless is a "non magnetic" metal, like copper.
The risk out ways the gain Always use thermal paste
I added LM on four GPUs and just one is working with the expected goal. The other three got back to normal WP. I am a miner thins a long time. I know what i do. I say, do not use LM if you have anything to ask about. ;-)
I like your video;s so much. Im also an electronics repair guy as you are, but you are way more professional than me. and you have more equipment. But i still learn from you. Thanks
Maybe the owner dropped the bottle when applying? thats the only thing i can think of that would cause that amount spilled on the board.
GPU and other component manufacturers love Liquid Metal. They love it because so many people will buy it for a minuscule increase in thermal conductivity and a portion of those people will ruin their components with it causing them to either buy a replacement component or pay an overpriced manufacturer repair when they try to RMA it. Glad they are keeping you in business though!
Would an ultrasonic cleaner remove all the liquid metal? Or is it too much faff? Edited - just saw the end of the video.
My question always is this: why anyone would even try such thing if they know shit about how to do it?
Terminator was here
Can you use magnets to remove the liquid? Like good magnets, Neo magnesium?
I had a Laptop come in with a cooked CPU due to a poor design by the manufacturer. They used Liquid Metal but never designed a way to keep the Liquid Metal on the chip die, so it ran everywhere, leaving nothing between the die and the heatsink. I first thought the client did it, then I thought for a second, wait, the seal was still intact.
I won't name the manufacturer.