Sorry for double posting, but it's "other department" news, after some time:

I've finally decided to do this mod properly. Indeed, with some patience, removing only lower part (with sensor) from rest of module was easy. No risk of broken ultra-thin cables, as lowest part have micro 2-pin connector, so everything fragile goes away with upper part of module.

Now, removing the Ir filter - that's another story. I thought about de-glue'ing plastic thingie that keeps it in place, but it's so tightly attached to PCB, that I was afraid of ripping sensor along. Sadly, cutting Ir filter (which is glass, not plastic), was only possible choice.

Holding sensor upside down (very important, to prevent gravitational fall of Ir filter glass dust into sensor), I've patiently weakened it using shaving blade, but it wasn't possible to remove it as one part - ended up breaking it in one place, and *carefully* removing remaining parts, everything with sensor upside down.

I'm perfectly sure that I haven't touched sensor itself, not scratched it, and after assembling module again, I got nice IR pictures. Hoever, I see many glass-dust particles on resulting image (without upside-down trick, it would be 2-3x as much). I've also got focus shift, which should be fixed, after I get hold on small piece of pure glass, to put it in place of IR filter. It seems to me, that the closer thickness of that replacement glass is kept to original filter's one, the more correct focus, but I may be wrong (any optics-knowledgeable people here?).

Now, i'm thinking about a way to removes that glass-dust from sensor. Cleaning with anything is a no-go - even using finest things, it leaves sensor in worse shape than before (tested on sensor from another, non-functional module). I got idea of sucking it via vacuum (for example, abusing vacuum cleaner on lowest sucking power, and making some adapter, that will allow me to safely vacuum'ise sensor without risk of touching it by anbything). Maybe someone here got better ideas?

/Estel