One working camera from two non-working cameras

On Friday, Nov 10, I led a Veterans' Day celebratory bicycle ride, you can read about it here. I snapped the picture shown with my "trusty" Kyocera Finecam SL400R. Two days later, it wouldn't power-on correctly, its LCD screen was plain white and showed no image. Upon examination, I noticed the crack on the left side of the LCD bezel (Click this picture to enlarge it to see the crack). Experimenting, I could press on the crack and the LCD might spring to life but no way could the camera be used in that manner.

The Kyocera Finecam SL400R has features like no other small point&shoot mini-camera. After mine (to keep the cameras separately identified, call it #1) fxed, I dearly wanted to repair it. I checked Kyocera's customer service, wanted $165 + parts + labor + S&H for repair. Out of the question! That would sum to far more that I paid for it originally.

So next thought was to replace it. No longer being in Kyocera's product line, used units were my only hope. I won two on eBay, #2 for $129 and #3 $98 inc S&H. I should've been satisfied, no? A camera FOR REPAIR offered on eBay had me itching. That cam won't power on, my cam #1 has defective LCD. Hmmmmmmmmmmm. Could I cobble one good cam together from two that don't work for different reasons?

Well, the first step was to see if I could disassemble #1. It wasn't easy and I had to manufacture a tool, just modified a mini-screwdriver I had, to reach a screw in a smaller access hole. Amazing, simply amazing, the huge amount of tiny componentry stuffed in the cam body. You can't knock the Koreans for cleverness.

In ~2 hours, I had #1 in pieces without damaging the unit further, one of which is the defective LCD screen. I sniped that cam for REPAIR on eBay up to $47, =$60 inc S&H. If I could win it, we'd see if DIY Eddy could put Humpty Dumpty back together again. Oops, I have to disassemble another cam first without breaking anything before reassembling anything.

I did win it! $36 + $13 S&H. Immediately upon its arrival, I stopped whatever I was doing and commenced disassembly, took about 45 minutes knowing exactly how to do it.

During disassembly of #4, I think I discovered why it wouldn't power on. See attached pic. At the top are three battery contacts. Don't ask me why it needs three instead of two, I dunno. The L contact is properly formed, the R two are bent away from the battery (upward in pic). When the battery is inserted, the L contact acts as a spring and springs the battery away (downward) such that the R two contacts don't make circuits.

In its state of disassembly where I discovered the bent battery contacts, I had two choices: 1) continue on plan to extract the part I needed, or B) straighten the bent contacts and reassemble it to see if my conjecture were correct. I chose 1, not having sufficient confidence that I'd diagnosed this correctly. I continued with my project to cobble the LCD from #4 into #1 replacing its cracked LCD. This worked and resulted in #1 being restored to full functionality. I'll never know if bending the R two contacts would also have worked.