Ok, so I had begun the process last week prior to your reply. Here's how it went.
I attempted to pull the shield off for about 30 mins with no luck. I eventually found that you have to 'prise' the shield off while heating the tabs, but individually. I didn't bother about damaging this as it can be easily bent back into shape.
Once this came off I wasn't sure where to start so I simply re-soldered each leg (8 of them) of the OP amp and also the D3 legs. Upon close inspection I realised that the legs may not have had enough solder so I attempted to add more solder. To others: DONT do this without a way to ensure only a SMALL amount is added. I accidentally added too much and all three legs on one side joined. My heart sank as I watched hundreds of dollars go down the drain. I got out the flux and attempted to suck all the solder off. Whilst doing this, I managed to melt the whole top of the plastic on the OP Amp chip as well as the D3 legs.
I did the best I could to salvage what I could and add bits of solder to random parts of the board. The pads on the silicon board were all destroyed and I believed it was all over.
I turned it all on (upside down and with cover off and turned it on). I strummed and nothing. I then moved my hand toward the pedal board and the sound would come back to my amazement. I couldn't figure out though, why when I moved my hand back the noise would subside and I'd lose all volume.
Then, I realised that because I had a work lamp flooding the entire area with light, the volume pedal was being affected. When I moved my hand toward it it was casting a shadow on the infrared proximity sensor under the volume pedal. So I put the backing plate back on and now it works better than it ever has. In fact I used to have a lot of grounding noise, now it's silent. Amazing. So even though the board is destroyed underneath, I must have managed to maintain a good solder connection on all 11 (8+3) legs.
Have used the pedal multiple days in a row and have had zero issues. No cycling issues etc.
Anyone else please comment if you end up resolving using marxman's, mine and others help!
