Solved Cracking open AXE-11000

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Dear all,

Asking for teardown advice.

Advice on next steps to open router case. Any help or suggestions would be appreciated.

One of my combined 2.4/5ghz antenna on my ASUS AXE-11000 is broken. Attempting self repair. Issue is with disassembly. I have various plastic spatulas/ “spuggers” but the router housing design is angular 45 degree angles , as opposed to 90 degree.

photos attached

of course Murphy’s law kicked in and the one broken antenna is in the corner that I can’t open.
I dont’t want to break it, the Ethernet ports, power in and power switch are all in that corner as well.

 

[dropilikeitshot]

Dear all,

Asking for teardown advice.

Advice on next steps to open router case. Any help or suggestions would be appreciated.

One of my combined 2.4/5ghz antenna on my ASUS AXE-11000 is broken. Attempting self repair. Issue is with disassembly. I have various plastic spatulas/ “spuggers” but the router housing design is angular 45 degree angles , as opposed to 90 degree.

photos attached

of course Murphy’s law kicked in and the one broken antenna is in the corner that I can’t open.
I dont’t want to break it, the Ethernet ports, power in and power switch are all in that corner as well.

I got it open.
Unfortunately the specification sheet I had listed the 2.4/5ghz antenna mounts as mfh4 and the 6g mounts as mfh4l. I ordered a mfh4 connector cable but it didn’t fit going to try the mfh3 type (on order). Also it doesn’t look like the board has MFH4l just regular MFH4 .

Note the board is split 50/50 5ghz/2.4 on one side 6ghz on other, so unless you have axe WiFi 6e hardware hold off on this model. Essentially a huge downgrade for 2.4/5ghz use case compared to ASUS ax-11000. Missing mfh is 2.4/5ghz the other photo is the 6ghz side showing the mfh4 connectors. I don’t see the lock release so I assume these are plain mfh4 cables / connectors on board.

 

[dropilikeitshot]

I added my old external antenna successfully. Router functions much better now. The fact that 25% of the radios in use had no antenna caused severe issues when the router was main. Currently still a node and functions much better with the replacement antenna.