PowerBook G4 Titanium – both hinges suddenly seized up, can’t open display

[victor.muc]

Hi everyone,


I’m running into a really strange problem with my PowerBook G4 Titanium (Mercury, 2001) and I haven’t found anything quite like it.

The machine has been working perfectly for months. I’ve always opened the display very carefully, slowly and with both hands. 4 days ago, while I was using it normally, I tried to adjust the screen angle and suddenly the lid wouldn’t move up anymore.

- I can only lift the lid about 2–3 cm, but that’s just because of a small crack in the side casing that flexes. The hinges themselves don’t move even a millimeter.

- Both hinges are completely solid, as if they’ve been glued.

- Closing the lid still works completely normally and smoothly, but opening is blocked like it’s hitting a hard stop.

- I removed the clutch covers and unscrewed the hinge mounts to compare them to my other Titanium. On the working one I can flip the hinges by hand, but on this machine neither hinge will move even slightly. They look perfectly straight from the outside, nothing appears broken or bent.


This all happened instantly, literally 10 minutes earlier the screen opened normally, and then both hinges seized up at the exact same time.


I’ve already tried applying sewing machine oil to the hinge joints and letting it soak for several hours, but so far there’s no change.


Has anyone experienced both TiBook hinges completely freezing like this (not broken, just locked solid)? Is there a known fix besides replacing the entire display assembly? Would oil + gentle heat be worth trying, or am I realistically looking at hinge replacement?


Thanks a lot for any advice or shared experience. I’d really like to save this machine without breaking the display.


Victor

 

[Certificate of Excellence]

Did you take the clutch covers off the hinges in order to apply your sewing oil?

I have not done this myself to a powerbook but you might consider using thermal expansion to possibly help free the hinges. Do this with the clutch covers off. You can accomplish this with a blow dryer on high heat blown directly on the exposed hinge. The idea is to force the hinge metals to expand which will squeeze and dislodge whatever corrosion is stuck and causing the hinge to seize. Also, as the metals cool, tiny cracks in the corrosion are opened allowing the penetrating lubricant to enter the hinge and help the hinge bits to move again.

Again I have not used this method on a Mecury Titanium PB but I have used it on an old P3 laptop I had which had begun to sieze up (they were very hard to move) and then begun to crack the lcd housing platics. It worked pretty well in that scenario.

Good luck

 

[victor.muc]

Did you take the clutch covers off the hinges in order to apply your sewing oil?

I have not done this myself to a powerbook but you might consider using thermal expansion to possibly help free the hinges. Do this with the clutch covers off. You can accomplish this with a blow dryer on high heat blown directly on the exposed hinge. The idea is to force the hinge metals to expand which will squeeze and dislodge whatever corrosion is stuck and causing the hinge to seize. Also, as the metals cool, tiny cracks in the corrosion are opened allowing the penetrating lubricant to enter the hinge and help the hinge bits to move again.

Again I have not used this method on a Mecury Titanium PB but I have used it on an old P3 laptop I had which had begun to sieze up (they were very hard to move) and then begun to crack the lcd housing platics. It worked pretty well in that scenario.

Good luck

Thank you so much!
Yes, I took off the clutch covers and applied the oil directly to the hinges (the black parts that should normally move).

Heat sounds like a great idea, I’ll definitely try that with a blow dryer when I’m back home later.