No serial read access on WR1043ND v2.1

[Michael Iline]

Hello everyone.
I've been working hard on trying to get FreeBSD on my wr1043nd v2.1 but I'm having a lot of trouble that nobody else seemed to encounter... Here is a forum post that I created on the topic:https://forum.openwrt.org/viewtopic.php?id=61240It contains a brief description of the issue as well as some photos of my board.
There are two reasons I'm posting on this list.First, I'm hoping someone can provide some insight on my problem.Second, maybe I can find a workaround. Viper-7 from ##electronics at freenode suggested that other methods of flashing the image may be used, since I do have an working OpenWRT installation. He recommended this: https://wiki.openwrt.org/toh/tp-link/tl-wr1043nd#flashingrecovery_using_tftp_only_without_serial_consoleI'd like to hear some thoughts before I go ahead and do this, as because of my serial writing issues bricking the device would be extra painful for me.
Please let me know of someone can provide some assistance, and be sure to tell me if you need any more info.
Thanks in advanceMichael