Stripped screws on N3DS XL

[StrayGuitarist]

I’m modding a mate’s New 3DS XL that has a custom paint job by his shitty ex. The paint was super amateurish and they painted over the back cover screws, which means I can’t actually get a screwdriver into them. They’ve had a rut dug into them where someone tried to unscrew them and stripped them a bit, meaning I can’t pop the cover off and get to the MicroSD Card. Anyone have any tips/tricks to get this backing off?

 

[zxr750j]

Picture helps
Normally: remove paint (with a needle, hobbyknife or something like that) and try the best fitting bit, sometimes a straight snug fitting screwdriver works better than a philips head. Last resort: drill the head of with a tiny drill, remove back plate and hope a pair of pliers can get enough grip to unscrew them (source some small screws to replace them). If all fails: Shell-replacement?

There is a lot of depth in the screw (I think JIS, not philips) so I would surely try a small straight driver, width counts.

 

[Tri-Z]

Get a small coffee straw at put it in screw hole and buy some cheap small screw drivers and some jb weld. Mix up the two jb weld pastes and glob on screwdriver tip and insert down the straw. Do enough times where there’s enough jb weld down in there to coat screw good then press in screwdriver and if can have some weight on it til dries. If can get screw driver to bond in there good u should beable to screw it out. Ur gonna have to replace the screws anyway. The straw will hopefully stop jb weld from touch inside of the covers hole so will beable to spin the screw.
Other option is just break off the plastic back then take a small vice grip and try and grab the screws and spin out. Then just buy a new plastic backing.

Personally I’d try the jb weld first. I don’t think the screws fully come out of that back cover. Think they have it that way so they don’t fall out and lose when take back plate off



Edit: maybe try the above users suggestion to get paint out and a better fitting screwdriver tip. I prob wouldn’t drill that screw out as it’s so tiny u are bound the damage the threads that hold the screw in. I’d much rather just damage the back plate the the devices threads that hold the back plates screw in. With that pic they posted I’m sure a cut straw and jb weld will work. Just make sure jb weld is only on screw head and screwdriver and straw. If it gets on cover that’s around the screw and drys, that screw won’t be turning

Also if screw head is raised enough u could take a tiny hacksaw blade to it so can fit a bigger flat head across the screw. But you’d have to get some tin foil or something to put over back plate so don’t scratch it

 

[Hayato213]

You can use a P0 bit, depending on how much of the screw is stripped you can use a P1 bit.

 

[RAHelllord]

If you have some sticky tape you can also just try to put that down and then press into it with a small screw driver, the glue might help in providing enough traction to get it unscrewed. I would suggest to first scrape off the paint residue, though.
If you try this obviously don't use too much tape, it only needs to touch the head of the screw and be enough to get pushed slightly into the head.

Otherwise jb weld or another metal epoxy should definitely work as described by Tri-Z above.

 

[StrayGuitarist]

It doesn’t show up well on camera but the screw holes are COMPLETELY rounded. It’s just a circle hole inside. I might try tape or glue, but this thing is pretty well on there. I’m not gonna shatter the back case of my friend’s console, lmao. We’ve only met somewhat recently and I don’t think that would leave a good impression.

EDIT: I got it off by pushing REALLY HARD with a #1 bit. Thanks everyone!