3 Ways to Remove Broken Dart Tips From Your Dartboard
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Like broken dart shafts, plastic dart points also run the risk of breaking in your barrel — and inside your dartboard as well! In this blog post, we'll go over the benefits of removing broken dart tips from your soft tip dartboard and easy methods for removal.
Why Should I Remove Broken Dart Tips?
The material makeup of soft tip dart points doesn't make them very durable — soft, flexible plastic runs the risk of breaking, especially for players with harder throws and aggressive gameplay. Thus, your soft tips can get broken inside the holes of your soft tip dartboard. While they're not an obvious or immediate obstacle, broken dart tips left in your soft tip dartboard may prevent your darts from sticking properly in the board.
Imagine you're aiming for the triple 20 and your throw is perfect... but your dart bounces out because there's a broken dart tip in the exact spot it would have landed. Frustrating, right? If you need to restore your dartboard for more seamless games, here are the 3 best ways to remove broken dart tips from your soft tip dartboard:
1. Use Needle Nose Pliers
Typically used for daintier metalworks and engineering, needle nose pliers are perfect for grabbing onto the broken dart tips stuck in your electronic dartboard. If you like getting handsy with hardware, you probably have some lying around in your toolbox.
As long as your broken dart tips are sticking out from the dartboard, you should be able to pull out the dart tip with your pliers. Simply grab onto the exposed broken piece and pull it out firmly until it's no longer stuck in the soft tip dartboard.
2. Use Your Fingers
If you got a strong grip, you might be able to pull out the broken dart tips with your fingers. This method of removing broken dart tips is the least reliable since it depends on your strength and how well you can grab the pieces, but it is the most convenient option that requires no additional tools.
To get a good hold on the broken dart tips, the pieces should stick out of the dartboard enough for your fingers to clamp onto. Use your nails for extra grip if you need to. Pull the dart tip out once you have the broken dart tips tight between your fingertips. It might take a few tries, especially if the tip is really stuck in there, but you can even try wiggling the broken dart tips to loosen it in the hole before pulling it out.
3. Use a Dart Tip Punch Tool
Unable to remove the broken point because it's stuck too deep? The best way to remove broken dart tips flush against the holes of your electronic dartboard is by using a dart tip punch tool. It's super simple and easy to use as well since the tool does all the work for you.
Place the nose of the dart tip punch tool over the broken dart tips while holding the tool as flat as possible, parallel to the ground. Push the back of the tool in a hard, swift motion to punch the broken dart tips through the segment into the dartboard, and voila! No more dart tips stuck in the board. Watch our Youtube tutorial above demonstrating how to use the Colonial Metal Tip Punch Tool to eliminate your broken dart tips.
Remove the Tips Inside the Dartboard
You got the broken dart tips unstuck with the dart tip punch tool — awesome! But... how do you take out the broken dart tips from your board?
When you punch the broken dart tips with the punch tool, the pieces land inside the dartboard itself and stay there until you take them out. Most soft tip dartboards have a catch in each segment where broken dart tips will fall so they're not just rolling around in the electronics of your board.
To remove the tips from inside your soft tip dartboard, first remove the screws in the back of your board and remove the back cover. If your board has a foam pad, remove it and VERY CAREFULLY fold back the dartboard matrix. Remove the rubber mat and find the segments with the broken dart tips inside. Pop open the cover and dump out the dart tips, then double check the front of the segment to ensure all broken dart tips have been removed.
Finally, follow the steps in reverse to put your soft tip dartboard back together. Return the segments to their original place and then gently put back all components of the board in order: rubber mat, matrix, foam padding (if present), and screw in the back cover.
A word of caution
Even though your dart tips may break and get stuck in your soft tip dartboard often, we do not recommend frequently disassembling your dartboard to remove any broken dart tips to prevent accidentally damaging your board. The electronics of your dartboard are extremely fragile, especially the matrix, and will no longer work properly if damaged.
However, if you own a Gran Board of any model, you might actually want to routinely remove your broken dart tips from inside the board. The Gran Boards segments have foam inside them and too many tips jammed in the same place can potentially damage your matrix.
Dart Points | Everything You Need to Know
Wanna learn everything you need to know about dart points, from soft tip to steel tip and everything in between? Read up on our Darts 101 blog all about dart points to optimize your dart setup and prevent broken dart tips:
Final Thoughts
There you have it: the 3 best ways to remove broken dart tips from your soft tip dartboard. We hope this helped you remove those pesky broken tips from your dartboard with no hassle! If you're struggling with broken dart shafts, don't forget to check out our tutorial below on how to remove those from your barrel using different methods and tools.
