Question Best method of repairing bent sata pins on hdds?

[JackBurton80]

hi everyone!

i wanted to know if some people can give me suggestions on how to repair bent sata pins on hdds? i have two. one is a 6tb that has bent pin on the sata power side and a 4tb that has a bent pin on the sata data side. they're both western digital. i have included pictures. as you can see they're internals. my cousin is going to help me try to figure this out. i figured i try to get further advice on here before he comes over. if we are successful in getting the pins repaired our plan is to gently put them in my two bay docking station and take the data and transfer them to a working hdd and then take them out when its done and trash the hdds that had the pins bent. however isn't there something you can buy that can fit over the pins and it can solve the problem? i thought i saw that on a youtube video once and the guy bought it off amazon i believe he said. anyone know what thats called if that can solve my problem? the last picture is a piece that broke off. thanks in advance.

 

[USAFRet]

For that level of bend...needle nose pliers, and be very very careful.
There is no magic tool or procedure for this.

 

[JackBurton80]

wait i thought the pictures resize when taken from imgur.

 

[Lutfij]

At this point of time, anything you do, you're going to have to gently coax the pins back into their former places but that broken piece of plastic might your challenge, perhaps use some super glue or JB Weld. I also doubt you're going to see that HDD efficiently make contact with your dock, chances are the pins might snag the connector in your dock and you end up being where you're now...or worse that the pin breaks, I'd try and connect the drive to an available SATA data and power connector on a build with laxed connectors and gently plug them in to the ports.

Additionally you're going to need a magnifying glass, an exacto knife and some thin head tweezers or forceps, IMHO.

 

[DSzymborski]

I'm with Lutfij, unfortunately. The pins are the easy part, the hard bit is going to be getting the plastic reattached; the SATA connector is kept snuggly connected by the bounds of the slot. You're kinda going to need to connect the pins to the pins and then somehow secure it into place. I hope the desire isn't to stick this back inside a PC and return to using it normally; I would only have the slightest confidence in getting it working just long enough to recover things that weren't properly backed up int eh first place.

 

[geofelt]

You might want to ask a local jeweler to do the job.

 

[JackBurton80]

thanks guys for your suggestions. but like i said i saw once on a youtube video that i since lost that showed some kinda thing bought off amazon that fit over the sata pin row and it looked like it solved the problem. anyone know if that could help me?

 

[USAFRet]

thanks guys for your suggestions. but like i said i saw once on a youtube video that i since lost that showed some kinda thing bought off amazon that fit over the sata pin row and it looked like it solved the problem. anyone know if that could help me?

Without know exactly the device you're referring to...no one knows.

 

[fzabkar]

One is a 3.3V pin, the other is a signal ground pin. The drive will work without them. I would break them off.

A missing signal ground might result in an increase in SMART UDMA CRC Errors, but these are benign.