Droid Maxx went in the hot tub...

[Tbretz]

Greetings,

My Droid Maxx went in the hot tub. It was in the pocket of my swim trunks. I am a big guy, and the trunks are a bit right, so it was a tight fit in the pocket. It was in about 5 min or so before I realized it. I yanked it out, and got into a bag of rice and barley within about 15 min. That's where it is now. This was about 10 hours ago.

There was no case on the phone. Straight up, naked droid.

I plan to leave it in the bag for about 36-48 hours. After that, I am open to suggestion as to my course of action. The phone was powered on when it went in the hot tub. I did not touch any controls afterwards. However, a scheduled alarm did not sound at 5:45pm, about 4 hours after the immersion.

I am open to any comments, suggestions, commiserations, etc.

Thanks,

- TAB

 

[Danvee]

Leave it powered down. Remove the back and battery.
http://www.ifixit.com/Teardown/Motorola+Droid+RAZR+Teardown/7048

Get silica gel packs from a sporting goods store. Leave sealed in the bag for 4-6 days, changing/drying out the desiccant twice a day.

Hope for the best..

 

[Jeffrey]

OOPS.. Not good. Hopefully Danvee's post will work for you. Do you have insurance?

 

[94lt1]

Ouch.. Hope you have insurance..And a lot of luck.

 

[RzrGrl]

I dropped my phone in water once also, but mine fell into the toilet. D'oh! Since it had never happened before my gut reaction was to try and power up. Since then, I've found out that's exactly what you're "not" supposed to do! (mine was also in the water about 5 minutes)

I went online to find out what I should do and read differing opinions on the rice thing. Since I didn't have any rice in the house, I just pulled the battery out and turned the phone upside down to let any water trickle downward.

I left it like that to dry out for 5 days and didn't touch it (as tempting as it was). After the 5 days I tried powering up but it didn't respond. I waited about 10 minutes and did it again and it worked. However, it was really sketchy for a couple of weeks (apps not opening, couldn't connect wifi, just a lot of little things).

Thought I was going to have to get a new phone, but over time it got better. It took a few months but it finally was up and running great. Of course, the little white dot on the back of the phone (or where the battery pops in, I can't remember) turned red, so that voided my warranty.

This was my first phone and I didn't think I would ever need insurance ... well, needless to say ... I sure the hell have it now!

I didn't know anything about the silica but that sounds like a good alternative to rice. Like Danvee mentioned, the key for me was letting it dry out thoroughly for as many days as you can stand it. ;-) hope it works out for you.

 

[Einsteindks]

What's the consensus on quick rinsing the powered-down phone, sans battery, in a bath of rubbing alcohol? It loves to grab/mix with water, and evaporates easily, completely.

fat-fingered and Maxx-ed out.

 

[Jeffrey]

Sounds logical but I wouldn't try it. I would do a hair dryer and then 5 days in the rice.

 

[Einsteindks]

Just curious, because it worked years ago on an HP 11c calculator that fell into a shallow duck pond.

fat-fingered and Maxx-ed out.

 

[Jeffrey]

I'm no expert, can the alcohol do any damage?

 

[Danvee]

First off, ordinary rubbing alcohol is 30-40% water, so, bad idea.
You can get 91% isopropyl alcohol, which is only 9% water.
Alcohol is hygroscopic and will absorb water, so any remaining will actually pull it out of the air.
If you completely disassemble the device, the 91% isopropyl is good to rinse all parts, but be warned that it might attack some of the seals and adhesives.
If you're not going to do a complete teardown, removing all port covers, back cover and battery before placing in the desiccant is best.
Also note that rice is usually dusty and can leave a starchy mess on wet surfaces. That's why I'd generally recommend the silica gel.

 

[Justinc]

Question for you folks. My MAXX took on some splashes of water yesterday and powered itself down on it's own, it was not completely submerged. At first I left sit on the car defrost vent on high heat for 30 mins trying to dry it out but that didn't seem to do anything. I then removed the back cover and found a little bit of water in there, not much but apparently enough to jack it up, so I put in rice for a few hours then hit it with the hair drier for 15, tried to power it up again and nothing. I'm starting to think that its going to be a total loss which I can live with but can all of my files that are stored in the internal storage be retrieved if the device will not power on? I"m a moron and haven't been backing it up on my PC for a while now so there are tons of pictures, videos and music that I'd like to have, but trying to connect via usb does nothing with the device off. Is it doable with the device off, either by me or a professional of sorts?

 

[Jeffrey]

I would make sure the battery is removed and leave it in the rice for at least 3 days.

 

[94lt1]

They do sell "wet phone recovery kits" at Walmart, RadioShack.. Any electronics stores.. Best buy even has them.. It contains silica gel and some even have pry tools to pull a phone apart.. They work better than rice because of not having any dust...

 

[doogald]

If you can't get silica desiccants easily you can also use silica cat litter - it's the same stuff. Make sure it's silica and not clay. This stuff, for example: Petco Crystal Cat Litter - Kitty Litter Available Online from petco.com

If you are going to use rice, Minute Rice is better than regular rice for this purpose. The idea is to put the phone in an environment with something that really wants to absorb water so that it will help pull water vapor out of the phone faster.

I have tried doing this with two phones and a camera in the past. In all three cases, the device did start working, but failed as more time went by. For one phone, the display went screwy; for the camera, the sensor was just capturing bad information and the images looked like crap. That said, the Droid Maxx does have some nanocoating to help protect against immersions, so you may get lucky.

 

[Justinc]

Well after my post yesterday, I remembered that I have another MAXX at home with a busted digitizer, only had the phone 2 months and dropped it, oops. But anyways, I thought to myself I'll just swap digitizers since this one is still in perfect working order otherwise, so I went and picked up a multi-tool kit with torx bit's down to T4, ripped the phone apart and found the short. I have no idea what you call it but there is a piece of data cable stuck to the back of the battery that folds over and connects to the motherboard, and the short appeared as a black dot where two of the three bands fused together. As I continued my disassemble with the phone that had the busted digitizer, OF COURSE the T4 screw stripped out so I had no choice (i tried everything i could think of) but to bust off the top piece that holds the camera, speaker, etc. In this process I knocked a three prong connector off the motherboard, thinking it was for the front facing camera which i could deal with. But as it turns out, it must have been for the forward facing camera and ear piece speaker because neither worked, but other wise the phone works great. The sad thing is, only 1 of the 4 water indicator stickers was partially all red, I knew it didn't take on much water but stuff happens. The motherboard with the shorted data cable is 100% unscathed so I'm pondering switching the digitizer back to it while stealing the data cable from the battery of the phone how it currently sits. I can deal with no forward facing camera but without an earpiece speaker its kind of useless to me.

Bottom line, if you have the patience and these little tools, before trying to fraud anyone or get hit with a 300 dollar bill, try searching for parts to rebuild what you have on your own. Its not difficult just BE CAREFUL and take your time. I plan to be back on the air in 4g by lunch time today.