Whatever gave you the idea of cooking it?

Are you trolling?

Don't judge me. I was born to be awesome not perfect.

 

Nope! Reflowing is a recognised practise. Check it out on YouTube...

 

This is interesting. Was your HFT unit also causing battery drain, or was it simply not working?

 

It was also contributing to battery drain. Since reflowing it, it seems to be holding charge better.

 

Not a joke!Several TypeAccord members have successfully done this to their Accord modules.

 

Prior to cooking it, it would either beep when pressing the call button but wouldn't allow you to even pair a phone (it would go through the whole process but would never find a phone) or simply nothing would happen at at all, no beep no nothing. Coupled with the battery going flat of you hadn't used the car for more than a couple of days. Since cooking it, it all works fine and I managed to pair my phone and there is no problem with the battery any more. Certainly cheaper than the Honda quoted price of £900 for a new module.

 

Maybe a bit of technical insight what's happening there:

You heat the electronics up, to about 230°C at which all the solder is molten again. After cooling down all the solder joints are renewed to a certain degree - as there is much less solder flux after the initial reflow soldering, the solder won't suck itself so nice to the pins of components anymore.

This helps if there are bad solder joints on the board, but puts the components under thermal stress, which can shorten their lifetime. If your module isn't working correct, the reduced lifetime is a non-issue, I guess.

You have to be careful though, as some electronic parts are not meant to be reflow-soldered. For example plastic connectors are often melting during reflow soldering, some come with a protection cap, which is taken off after the first reflow process and you will damage them in the second run. Parts where the leads go through the board are often not meant to be reflow soldered.

The reflow soldering temperature profiles are actually quite tightly specified by the part manufacturers but often enough the stuff survives a normal oven.

If you have one available, stick a thermocouple temperature probe on the board somewhere and observe the temperature during the process, after reaching 210-230°C (410°F - 446°F) shut down the oven and open the door. There is no need to keep that temperature over a prolonged duration (in profiles it's around 10 seconds maximum at that temperature).
Don't take out the board immediately as the temperature shock could lead to parts cracking. After letting it sit there for 2-5 minutes it should be okay to put it out and let it cool down completely.

If you have an air circulation available in your oven, use it, as it will decrease hot spots on the board.

I actually bought a small pizza oven for stuff like that. I saved one graphics card and a laptop using this method. Some companies had trouble as they introduced lead-free solder (which has a higher melting temperature) leading to a lot of failures with bad solder joints.

Sorry if that was all :spam: for you, I just couldn't help it :alberteinstein:

 

I did my bake off exercise today but something went wrong. Socket has melted :smile3:

I was able to actually connect module after cutting off melted part and readjusting pins - still drains battery and no BT available.

 

I did my bake off exercise today but something went wrong. Socket has melted :smile3:

I was able to actually connect module after cutting off melted part and readjusting pins - still drains battery and no BT available.

A colleague of mine at work with an Accord did something similarbut not to the same extent – he got away with it too and it all works nowthough. Maybe parts like that should beprotected with some baking foil whilst in the oven…

 

how would I remove the OEM HFT kit/module? I will be fitting my own kit and don't want or need the OEM kit. I notice from my cars history that it has in the past suffered from battery drain (which seems to have been fixed touchwood) but I would like to eliminate this kit from any future problems

 

Does anyone know whats missing from this? I baked it and, unfortunately when I tooked it out, I dropped it and its at least one of the resistors that felt off. Where is it supposed to go ?

 

Compare with this photo.

 

were going to need some higher resolution pictures than those to help... they are too blurred and low res...

 

seems that the forum made them low res . sorry about it.
they were taken with an s8 and on the device they are quite clear.

 

@Knottz
Is there any other picture with a better quality? I did fixed something following this one, but I still have a resistor left and dunno where it goes .

 

Looks like (from your pic) a capacitor that’s fallen off. Check relevant voltage tracks and trace it.

 

Hi all, have read all these posts as I'm having similar connection problems. I have tried video search and google search for the location of the bluetooth module. Could someone confirm where it is for UK 2008 model accord as ive seen either behind stereo or in drivers footwell. I would like to confirm prior to pulling the car appart. Many thanks in advance, Matt.

 

In the drivers footwell. Its a 2 minute job to remove.

Open the door and remove the dashboard end trim - just pulls off.
Remove the single screw behind the trim you just pulled off.
Under dash panel pulls down from the trim clips and the HFT is attached to this panel by 2 screws

2 minutes includes finding the screwdriver!

 

Is that for an Accord?

 

If you mean me M8TJT, then its where my HFT module was in a Civic EX. Very easy to get to.

 

Yes it was you Robbie and thanks for the clarification.
I suspect the Matt's Accord footwell is just as easy to get at. I know it was pretty easy in the two Accords that I owned , but they were both more recent than Matt's. It would be a worthwhile exercise to give it a tug to see if the HFT module is in the same or similar place on Matt's Accord.

 

Aah, ok. Hadn’t picked up it was an Accord we were talking about. Sorry.