Quick question about chargers for electronics

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When a charger gets to the point of age, where they have to be bent or held in a certain way to actually charge something, is it a danger to the electronic?

Quick example: phone needs to be charged. Only available charger is messed up but still works only if you bend it a certain way. Will it mess up the charging port on the phone? Will it damage the phone in any way?

I am currently hyper and on a mission to fix a DS, questions above are related to the charger for the DS i have on hand. Thank you.

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My phone charger is like that and has been for years. Its 14 years old and the cable is no longer being made. I have to use a rubber band to keep it in position to charge the phone. The phone hasn't been damaged so far.

I'd guess if the phone is charging properly, its probably fine. That being said I would replace your charger when or if you can. Just to be on the safe side.

Thin copper wires often break or become intermittent. Holding electronics a certain way may hold the connection together. It can be hard to fix since most electronics is not designed to be taken apart.

Though I just took apart my keyboard and fixed a stuck button.
All the screws holding it together were easily accessed! No hidden screws under a label!

Bending the charger's plug while it's in the device's socket won't do the device any good, but whether or not it'll do any harm depends on a number of factors that are probably hard to determine. I'd recommend being careful, i.e. don't bend it any harder than you need to. Might be worth borrowing a new(er) charger either from a friend or by blatantly trying a new one out in a shop. If that doesn't work without bending, there's little point in buying a new one and it's probably the device's socket that's getting worn out or dirty.

I just found this, which may give you a few ideas:

https://www.ifixit.com/Answers/View/170 ... tain+angle.

It might well be a dirty socket on the device, but I'd be very careful about cleaning it yourself if it's an expensive device. Nonetheless I'd probably have a go. And it can't do any harm to shine a light in there and take a look, using strong reading glasses.

My old mobile dumbphone had a rubber plug thingy to keep dirt out of the charging socket, but after a few years it fell off and got lost. It's a shame if they don't sell cheap packs of spare rubber plug thingies.

its not usually a matter of socket damage or a frayed or broken wire, but the act of plugging and unplugging that pushes pins in the connector out of position. Sometimes you can bend them back to where they should be, but its a lot easier to buy a new charger. All 3 of the DS models are still widely available and not expensive.