Fixing a Broken Wacom Pen
Two weeks ago, I accidentally drop my Wacom Pen. It happened several times before but this time, the pen stop working 
The tablet could not detect the pen tip but the eraser tip was still working.
It’s an old model which I bought on 2002 (Wacom Graphire 2) and the replacement pen cost around 40 Euro 
Now I am using a mouse.
Three years ago, I decided to stop using computer mouse and rely 100% on my Tablet. Actually, I was training my eye-hand coordination using the tablet. I found it’s more natural to use a pen so since then, I stick with it. It’s also good for your wrist since I read somewhere that you could reduce the risk of getting Carpal Tunnel.
I plan to buy a new tablet later (maybe the Wacom Bamboo) so it’s worth it to try repairing the pen 
Click more to see my step-by-step instruction (with photos) how to fix a broken Wacom Pen 
Disassembling the Pen
Just pull the part which has erase tip on it. Do not twist it coz the pen will break. If your hand is sweating you can try to use rubber glove for a better grip.
In order to pull out the electronic board, you have to take off the pen buttons. Just carefully use a screwdriver to peel off the button.
Now pull the board slowly and put it on a safe place. The electronic part looks fragile so you might have to handle it with care.
Fixing the Broken Black-Iron-Thingy
As you can see from the photo below, the black iron near the pen tip is broken. This fragile part is easily broken if you drop the pen. Luckily, I found on the Internet that someone has successfully super-glued that part and the pen works 
Super Glue Saves the Day
Unplug the pen tip (the pointy white plastic part) before you superglue the iron part. Just put a few drops on the crack and push the iron thing with your thumb so the crack is close together. Hold that position for 40 seconds until the glue is dry. (Note: Please be careful with the glue. Later in this post, you will know that I’ve messed up the glue)
Is It Working?
After I put all parts together, I tested my Wacom Tablet. It worked ) !!! The cursor moved responding to my pen tip position.
However, when the pen tip touch the tablet surface, the tablet failed to detect a mouse click.
There was still a problem with the pen tip 
When I unassembled the pen, I realized that the pen tip plastic part was accidentally glued to the iron part. I think, the glue wasn’t dry enough when I put the pen tip back. The result, the pen tip was glued to the iron part and get stuck. The pen tip cannot detect the pen pressure since it cannot move anymore
Lessons of the Day
- Be careful when gluing the broken part. Make sure you are not gluing unnecessary parts
- If you rarely use the erase tip (like me), have a lot of time and soldering skills, you might try to unsolder the erase tip part (including the black iron part) and solder it back to the pen tip side. It seems that the iron parts from pen and eraser tip are the same. Maybe they’re interchangeable?
- Never drop your Wacom pen
Update (May 2009): I add a new post about soldering the erase part to the front , replacing the pen part.
Abiyasa loves to play and design game, especially designing the character and fun game play. His works are inspired by Anime and Japanese games.
The Black Iron Thing Was Broken On Mine Too But The Wire Had Gotten All Weird And Stuff cause i did it wrong D; and now i have to buy a new pen T,T…….
I had the same problem, followed your tut and everything is OK now! Thanks man, i have a lot of work in progress!!!
Oh my pen not stopped working, but can’t stop clicking, not recognize click, only pressure. Eraser it’s ok, that solution solve my problem?
HOLY SHHHHH
we have the exact same problem and I tried using the *naked* tablet while holding together the black metal part and it worked!!! I’ma just have to put some super glue on when I go out later. XD
Trying out this fix-it now. Took about 20mins to take off the pen body parts apart. No broken black iron or internal wires, thankfully, but I need to get something off that is stuck inside the pen tip chamber. Wish me luck with putting it all back together and making it work. Cheers – /K
can u just pull the pen apart without taking off the button cus im having a hard time getting the buttons of bc i cant find a screw driver. x.x
I also have the CTE-450, and had the exact same problem (broken black thingy.) I went with the soldering, which worked beautifully. The trick with the CTE-450 is that the little gray part above the buttons is holding it together, so you have to pry it off first (which I didn’t know, so I ended up breaking a little peice off with a knife).
Thanks so much for these instructions!
Cheers, Man! I just tryed it, and it looks like it will work! Thanks a million!
ANd it does work! Perfectly!
Thanks man!
And I promise I will never let it drop again!
My problem is that one of the wires has been severed completely. how do I fix that?
HA! This is great! Thank you sooo much. It almost fixed my problem, however, unlike all your nice friends, I THREW mine against the wall. (I thought I had lost all my layers in a complicated drawing!) I raged. I tried the repair and the stylus ALMOST worked … it kept jumping around the monitor. Something small and movable must also be broken. But I certainly appreciate your help. Thanks again.
This post gave me the confidence to pull apart my Intuos2 pen, solder back the wires and save myself €110. Okay, i basically had to snap the pen in 2, the Intuos pen doesn’t have two handy push-together parts – but the electronics are remarkably similar.
Thanks again.
I linked to this blog from my website. I made a tutorial also. Important things to add to your howto:
1) Once the iron core (black thing) is snapped, it will never absorb the electromagnetic waves with as much efficiency as before. In other words, the working distance of the pen from the tablet will decrease, regardless of whether or not the superglue job is done well.
2) Another option is to desolder the eraser coil and the tip coil and switch them. You can still fix the coil, but use it in the eraser which (in my case) is almost never used. It’s more normal to expect a smaller distance when erasing than when you’re writing. The decreased distance is not that noticeable if you use absolute positioning. With relative positioning, however, it becomes very annoying.
Okay, I’ve followed the easy steps.. but thing the is… the pen parts will NOT separate to where I completely see the motherboard!!
I mean, I can not take that one bit apart to go any further!! Any help there? 
Thank you sooo much!!!. It fixed my problem
after fixing my pen TWICE thanks to your helpful info, i found myself unable for the third time. then i made the amazing discovery that if you simply set eraser to “click” instead of its default “erase” status, the eraser works just like a pen.
Thanks!
Zoe
Thanks for this post. It absolutely saved my Intuos4 pen. When my pen suddenly quit (the eraser worked) I looked all over the web for answers. Strangely, Wacom doesn’t offer *any* help. You gave the the courage to tug (hard) on my pen and it came apart. Inside I found one of the wires had become disconnected from its solder connection. I re-soldered it, put it all back together and, voila! It works.
Eek I washed my pen in my trac suit- took it apart rubber gloves and all had it was an old purple one Was difficult to separate- snapped the motherboard in half – so upset have work to do – would the water have riuined it anyway?
Depressed
Great, I switched the coils and works perfectly.
Thank you very much
Hey guys ) But how to disassemble New Pens for Bamboo? God ive tried it except smashig it with a hammer )
Any ideas? Please )
first I tried the gluing method… it worked but the cursor skipped and jumped at certain times.
then i tried the soldering method… quite worried at first as i didn’t dare do it. But after i did it, IT WORKS AGAIN! i mean like nothing happened to it.
just becareful not to make the solder to thick or else you can’t put it back in. i had to remove some after i realized it was too tight.
I never used the Eraser any way so thank goodness for that.
I’ve just fixed mine. Instead of putting the superglue directly on it, I used a toothpick to put it exactly where I wanted it in the right quantity. It worked like a charm
just fixed mine. I had problems with oversensitivity. It responded (clicked) when i came close. I pulled of the smalle plastic grey top on intuos 2 (if you pull hard at the back holding the front it will come lose and the print plate is access, for once getting mad worked for me;) ) i pulled of the grey top from the yellow case. And switch the small parts inside. (i lost some looking on the ground for 10 min. Look out there really really small and lookout you dont loose the feathers in the back. Now the eraser doesnt work anymore but the tip works!! yahoo!! great!
Excellent! I just dropped my pen and it stopped working. Five minutes later, having found this on Google, it’s working again. Thanks a lot for this little tutorial!
hey, my bamboo fun pen broke some time ago. As with the others’ problems mine is sensitivity; it gets clicked when I get it near my tablet(both tip and eraser). I tried opening it with the tutorial above but I didn’t see anything broken inside. Is there something I missed? Please help, thanks.