Recycled Bluetooth Spekaer

 At the local market I both this Bluetooth speaker in parts but since it was cheap ~$1 I though it would be great project and i would love to save it from trash. I had no idea what is wrong with it or is it complete.

 LIST OF TOOLS:

The list of tools is not large and contains more or less basic DIY tools:

- Dremel with circular saw blade

- MS polymer glue and glue gun

- Drill with small drill bits

- Soldering iron

- Small rasp and or sanding paper

- Screws, tape, zip ties, scissors…

BATTERY Charger and tester:

Li-ion Lithium Battery Capacity Tester - ZB2L3

Li-ion Lithium Battery Charger – TC4056A

It was first necessary to establish whether all the parts were present and working and whether anything needed to be repaired.

Well the speaker has a micro USB charging connector and it was smashed and it fell off --- It could not be charged anymore I looked online pin out for micro USB connector and solder two wires for plus and minus and it tested fine.

The donor speaker in which I will put all the parts of this disassembled speaker is plastic one and has approximately the same volume as the original speaker. It is ideal for me that it is plastic because it will be great for outdoor use and after a little cleaning comes the next step and that is to check if the new speaker fits in its new housing. Everything is perfect so I can continue.

I will keep the back of the original speaker because there are buttons and it will be easy to install PCB and it will also give extra protection in case of fall there is no damage to the main board, screen and so on.

After the speaker was washed, it was wet sanded because there was a lot of damage, dirt and paint on it, the result was great and I left the speaker in the original black color.

 I will make an opening on the plastic case, on the back so that I can mount the original frame for controls and PCB main board. I will glue it, but I will also be using screws so it is physically strong, especially if it falls.

The front metal speaker grille is aligned with hammer :) and painted.

The front of the speaker is cut out so that the rhythmic RGB LEDs can be seen. The entry of dust was prevented by gluing a transparent plastic over the cut plastic.

The speaker is also glued but screwed into plastic to prevent separation if, for example, the speaker falls.

For glue, I use MS polymer glue which is used a lot in industry as for example in electronics you often see that the components are glued with white mass, well that is MS polymer.

 I didn't work much on electronics. After disassembling the basic components I have: main control panel with BT, white PCB board with LED lamps, battery, antenna, battery and one RGB 5 mm LED that illuminates the speaker and speaker.

The main board is working fine only what is faulty and probably the reason why it was disassembled and thrown away is that the USB mini connector fell off. I soldered directly (instead of the connector) the cable and the DC connector through which the battery is charged.

The battery is also correct but low capacity (1200mAh) so I used the batteries from the old laptop to increase the capacity by approximately 4 times. I used a battery of 3 cells that are connected in parallel.

I tried to change the antenna wire with other thicker ones but somehow it works best with the original antenna, so I still didn't change it.

 Assembling the speakers was easy. The metal grille is easy to return and the edges are bent so that it does not fall out. Mounting the main board is also easy because I used the original case from the old speaker, it is held in place by screws.

The DC charging connector is a panel version and is screwed with a nut. It is charged with standard 5V power supply brick.

Battery, antenna and LED white board, rubber pads for the outside and the rest is glued with MS polymer.

The battery lasts for about 50 hours, it's hard for me to say exactly because if the sound is lowered it lasts longer.

The sound is great when you consider what it's made of, it has a nice color of sound whether it's playing via BT, USB, SD card or via radio.

I have been using the speaker for a long time, over 6 months, it is great for outdoor and indoor use.

I thought of putting a switch in the beginning so that I could turn off the LED lights, but since it turned out to be a small consumer and the battery lasts a really long time, I gave up on the switch.

The only thing I might change is maybe one day I will install a telescopic antenna for the radio instead of the wire that is the antenna, but even that is not my priority because it captures the signal well.

It is of great dimensions, if it were bigger, it would not suit us (everybody is using it in family). It is also great that it is plastic because it has been in the rain for a couple of times in garden and the plastic is easy to wipe off.

All in all I have not regretted it, I am very happy to have it and I like that it is recycled. In fact, I could buy all the components, but this way it is compact, cheap, reliable and has all the options that I might not have if I had bought the components.