Microsoft Surface Pro 5 Camera Tie Bar Replacement

Written By: Paul Manzer

Comments: 8

Microsoft Surface Pro 5 Camera Tie Bar Replacement

Difficulty

Difficult

Steps

Time Required

2 - 3 hours

Introduction

The camera tie bar mounts the front and rear cameras as well as providing additional mounting support for the right and left speakers. It also connects to the motherboard via a small ribbon cable.

Tools

Parts

Surface Pro 5/6 Adhesive Strips

Step 1

Use a spudger to flip up the small locking flaps on the display cable ZIF connectors.

Step 2

Use tweezers to slide the display cables straight out of their sockets on the display board.

Step 3

Slide an opening pick under the display board to separate the adhesive holding it onto the back of the screen.

Step 4

Remove the display board.
During reassembly, use a strong double-sided tape or a precut adhesive card to secure the display board. Clean off the old adhesive before applying new adhesive.
To ensure correct positioning, plug in both display connectors before adhering the board to the display.

Note, on the flex connectors of the new screen are blue strips of protective plastic covering factory applied conductive adhesive. These must be removed and the adhesive must bond to the display board in order for the touch screen digitizer to function reliably.

Bill Mills -

Step 6

Insert one point of a pair of pointed tweezers into a gap in the corner of the EMI shield covering the heat sink.
Use the tweezers to pry the EMI shield away from the motherboard as much as you can without bending it. Do not remove it yet.
Try not to deform the shield too much—you will need to reinstall it during reassembly.
Take care not to puncture the battery with the tweezers while working on this shield.

Black spudger worked best to get the emu shields out without damaging them.

Randall Takahashi -

Step 7

Repeat the last step for each corner of the EMI shield covering the heat sink.

Step 8

Remove the heat sink shield.

Step 9

Remove the ten Torx screws securing the heat sink:
Five 2.6 mm-long T3 screws
Four 3.3 mm-long T5 screws
During reassembly, tighten the heat sink screws in the following criss-cross pattern, one turn at a time, until they're tight:
Screw 1
Screw 2
Screw 3
Screw 4

Just like to add, on my i7, there is a fan in the top left corner and the heat sink is glued to the cover. The cover must be removed using a ph0 x 3 and one T3 (I think that is the sizes)

Richard Wellesley -

As the other person commented, mine also had a fan connected to the heatsink. This is present in the version with an Intel Core i7-7660U. It requires removing a T3 and T5 screw and the fan connector. Below is a link to an image showing this step.

Surface Pro 5 with fan

Brian T -

While I do not have the fan present in my i5 version, the copper heat pipe does extend further down on the far left side (as oriented in the picture). There is an additional T3 screw on this arm as well as a small dab of adhesive on the very end.

Emma Strainis -

My i5 surface pro 5 has 6 of the T3 screws as the heat sink extends slightly further down.

Joshua Dunsire -

Step 10

Use the flat end of a spudger to gently pry the heat sink straight up and off of the CPU.
Take care not to dent or crease the heat sink pipes during removal.
During reassembly, make sure to properly clean the heat sink and CPU, and apply new thermal paste.