Spudger

Well, it's new to me!

Today I discovered the 'spudger' - a wide variety of shapes of stainless steel tools for prying apart objects like phone screens or anything that needs a blunt edged but thin blade to carefully separate them. Particularly semi-permanent glue joints.

I never knew I needed one but having seen them I can think of several past jobs where tone would have been handy,

Neil

A word much-used by iFixit

MichaelG.

Health & safety gone mad! What's wrong with a trusty old stanley knife blade and the added excitement of the resultant bloodbath when when a piece breaks off!

They would not have needed one to take the back off the Fairphone (unless they bite their nails).

Incidentally, the word is unknown to the OED.

Edited By ega on 16/01/2023 11:31:57

I very recently came across the word when looking on-line for car dash cameras. A "spudger" is included with some models to help fit the wiring under the vehicle trim.

I was recently given a grand kids IPhone 11 as the charging socket was broken. Also an iPhone 11 is SO OLD Grandpa. I had a quick look on the internet of how to replace the socket ie: total strip down to remove the socket and its flexible circuit track and to buy one it was 10euro delivered didn't seem too much of a punt if it all went wrong. A few days later, the goods arrived which included the 4point screwdriver, the 3 point screwdriver, the "Torx" driver, 2 plastic spudgers, 2 pry bars . Not bad for 10 euros I thought.

To remove the screen, you heat the whole unit up carefully with a hair dryer to melt the waterproofing glue, then use the spudgers to pry the screen off. The spudgers were of no use, and resorted to using a small penknife before I could get the spudgers in to complete removal of the screen.

Disassembly went well, placing the various screws and components not a sheet of A4 and itemising them where possible.The screwdrivers were essential and although not best quality, did the job.

The old socket and foil circuit was removed and replaced with the new one. Following a web tutorial, re-assembly went well even if it took 3 hours and once completed, there was only one small clip that was remaining on the sheet of A4. I reckoned that it was not essential and could be considered redundant.

I powered up the device - no beeps, no screen. I tried all the resets, hard resets and tricks to no avail.

So the phone now sits in the box of come in handy stuff - that never comes in handy, but for only 10 €.....

But to get back to the subject, these spudgers were too soft and not a lot of good.

Bob

Edited By Speedy Builder5 on 16/01/2023 12:14:29

A sort of a miniature version of a podger.

I have found the rounded end on some steel rules does a good job.

Martin

Noooo a podger is round, like an undernourished marlin spike.

I was trying to get a old Asus tablet apart and found a 10 inch carving knife working it along the edges to stop it snaping back instead of a craft knife

Well, it's new to me!

Obvious you don’t watch ‘bigclivedotcom’ on youtube, Neil.🙂

Spudger.... Now try that in 'Scrabble' or the next pub-quiz! "Is it a), an old form of .... ?"

What is the purpose of the scales shown on some of them? To help the user limit their penetration into the work?

Neil - if you google "phone repair kit spudger" or similar you will find a number of inexpensive kits from the far east with several spudgers and other tools intended for phone disassembly. Some are very handy for electronics other than phones as well. Handy to have a set "just in case" although most are very light duty tools. You won't be prying the cylinder head off a diesel tractor engine with them, but for phones and watches and circuit boards they are useful.

It seems we are introduced to spudger when we take on the task of repairing a phone, the tools are also useful for most electronic devices that snap together. Fighting your way into a laptop without a variety of spudger type tools usually results in damage to the joints.

Mike

Long before the spudger I used plectrums aka guitar picks for this sort of task. you can get a set of different thicknesss, often with a holder, on ebay or amazon for little more than postage costs
Random ebay example:

www.ebay.co.uk/itm/125665953464?

Robert G8RPI.

I had heard of it being associated with custom made tools of this type, but would have expected it to have turned up in the OED by now, its not a new word.

 Reminds me of that Blackadder episode with Robbie Coltrane.

Edited By old mart on 16/01/2023 19:10:39

I had previously come across the word before, but forgotten about it completely.
It looks like the term, for this article, has been around since the 1920's rather than just turning up in the 2020's, though its origins might even be the middle ages.

Link

https://english.stackexchange.com/questions/490428/origin-of-the-word-spudger

Bill

Great link, Bill

Putting the word into an Espacenet search returns 356 results

… No, I don’t plan to read them all.

MichaelG.

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The earliest being from 1912, at which time the word seems to have been sufficiently well-known to need no special definition :

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Edited By Michael Gilligan on 16/01/2023 21:40:41

Is this the iPhone 11 after you’ve spudged it for 3 hours?