Recovering from a water damaged cell phone

Wet Phone

This guide comes from personal experience.  My Motorola Razr went through a full wash cycle (40 minutes) and 5 minutes in the dryer, and it works fine.

You may search Google and come up with some things such as “put it in the oven in tin foil” or “put it in the dryer”.  Don’t do it! You will most likely do more harm than good, because you will melt things. 

Don’t worry about your warranty.  It’s void now anyways, because of the water exposure.  When you do step 2 (taking the battery out), you will probably see a red or pink dot.  This is a water exposure indicator, which will make your warranty void.

Step 1
Don’t panic! No matter how much you scream, beat your head against the wall, or punch things, it won’t help… especially don’t do things to your now-wet cell phone.

Step 2
Don’t turn it on.  If it was on when it was wet, and is still on, turn it off immediately.

Remove the battery, SIM/GSM card, and whatever else can be removed without the use of a screw driver immediately.  Cutting off power is the key, because cell phone circuits are very sensitive.

Step 3
Set the disassembled phone in a warm, sunny place.  Let it dry for 2-3 days.

To reiterate point 2 above, don’t do anything drastic, namely involving ovens or dryers.

Step 4 (optional)
After 2-3 days, if you want to make very sure it is dry, take a hair dryer on the lowest setting, and lightly dry the phone and miscellaneous parts.  Hold it away from the phone/parts, all you want is moving air.

Step 5
Reassemble the phone.  Plug it in and charge it.

Try to turn it on.  Most likely it will. If it does, wonderful!  If not, it may just be time to replace it.  Most phones will turn on…

Step 6 (optional)
You may want to replace the battery. For example, mine doesn’t hold a charge as well as it used to.  Some claim they will leak.

I hope this guide helps.  Most cell phones will be recovered.  I would love to hear your horror stories in this article comments.

Originally written by: SpaceMan3750

Tags: cell phone, mobile phone, phone, water damage