Hardware Right Joy-Con will only work when attached to console after shell swap

[7Robins]

I was working on swapping out the shells of my sister's Joy-Cons for her birthday when I hit snag with the right one.

The right Joy-Con refuses to charge or connect wirelessly. When railed onto my console (and her's), the battery displays at red, but the Joy-Con functions completely normally. However, as soon as I remove it, it stops working. The LEDs on the side don't flash at all, and I can't connect it wirelessly to my console. I assumed that something happened to the battery (like perhaps the battery is dead and won't charge), but I've tried everything I can think of including swapping out the batteries and rails, which did nothing. In the Controllers menu, an empty battery with a red sliver appears, and I can't get it to display anything else. The same thing displays when I connect a Joy-Con with no battery attached. I'm extremely confused too because the left Joy-Con that I shell-swapped works flawlessly, even when connected wirelessly.

The only thing that I can think of that might be malfunctioning is the motherboard, but that should make it so that the Joy-Con is completely dead, right? Or perhaps I somehow screwed up the battery connector, so it's not detecting the battery. I feel like I'm going crazy, testing everything I can think of to make this work. Someone, please help.

 

[SlegBE]

Check if Joycon ribbon is put correctly in the connector. Remove it and replace it again will probably solve your problem. (Right Joy-Con is more "difficult" to put in the connector than left one)

 

[7Robins]

Check if Joycon ribbon is put correctly in the connector. Remove it and replace it again will probably solve your problem. (Right Joy-Con is more "difficult" to put in the connector than left one)

I went through the trouble of basically reassembling the entire joy con and checking all of the ribbon cables. I'm convinced that everything is done correctly, it just won't detect the battery for some reason.

 

[SlegBE]

My mistake I thought you describe a problem with the joy-con 's rail on the Switch mainboard.
Yes for sure the problem concern ribbon and connector in the joy-con.
Check them carefully...

 

[7Robins]

My mistake I thought you describe a problem with the joy-con 's rail on the Switch mainboard.
Yes for sure the problem concern ribbon and connector in the joy-con.
Check them carefully...

I think something else might be wrong as well. I've noticed that the connection from the Joy Con and the Switch is messed up. Not only is the battery not detected, but the connection seems to fizzle in and out. Randomly, the Joy Con won't be detected when I rail it to the console, and then it'll come back.

This makes me think that perhaps the rail is damaged, but I swapped the rails and that didn't seem to do anything. The ribbon cables also all look like they're seated fully. I'll certainly try it again later, but I'm thinking I'll just need to get a new motherboard.

 

[yuu9]

Hi !! I'm having the same problem as ur problem. I even try to change to SR rail but nothing worked. I was wondering if you finally found the cause of this issue ? thank you in advance !

 

[CloudStrife1901]

Hi !! I'm having the same problem as ur problem. I even try to change to SR rail but nothing worked. I was wondering if you finally found the cause of this issue ? thank you in advance !

Same here for me after changing the shells on mine yesterday. No lights at all on the joycon itself. Did you fix yours?

 

[Bazzaro]

I had the same issue when doing a shell change. I found that it was the battery connector that had caused the issue. I got mine working again by just unplugging / reconnecting / wiggling the connection with all components out of the shell but still connected to the board and pressing the BT connect button on the side of the rail to check if working. All of a sudden the lights all came on and I very carefully put everything back in the shell. The first time I saw light and closed the shell the lights went off when I started screwing it closed. So took it apart again, did the same thing and just kept watching the lights as I closed up the shell.

 

[CloudStrife1901]

I had the same issue when doing a shell change. I found that it was the battery connector that had caused the issue. I got mine working again by just unplugging / reconnecting / wiggling the connection with all components out of the shell but still connected to the board and pressing the BT connect button on the side of the rail to check if working. All of a sudden the lights all came on and I very carefully put everything back in the shell. The first time I saw light and closed the shell the lights went off when I started screwing it closed. So took it apart again, did the same thing and just kept watching the lights as I closed up the shell.

Just tried the battery part. I think it's the ribbon cable on mine. Just ordered the parts so will be arriving tomorrow. Fingers crossed it works again