How much to repair a wet phone?

shadragon · Jan 17, 2012

Good Day,

Hypothetically speaking, if someone had an HTC phone that got wet*, how much would the ball park figure be for repair?

Thanks

S

* - In no way am I referring to my girlfriend leaving her brand new HTC Rhyme in her jacket pocket on a deck chair outside, moments before a torrential downpour hit the house last weekend for two hours. I am in no way referring to that incident. I want to make that perfectly clear.

Martimus · Jan 17, 2012

Hypothetically, if someone were to do that, I'd hope that they'd immediately remove the battery from the phone and place both the phone and battery in a bag of uncooked rice. After sitting there for several days, they could try removing both (cleaning off any excess rice), reconnecting the battery to the phone, and trying to re-start the phone. Uncooked rice could very possibly wick away any moisture from the inside of the phone.

If the phone is covered under insurance then it might be prudent to look into getting it replaced that way. Taking the phone to a third party to replace the internals is going to be expensive and no guarantee that something else won't fail in the meantime.

Worst case, the cost of such a mistake could, theoretically of course, be equivalent to the retail cost of a replacement phone. According to Verizon, retail price of the HTC Rhyme is $439.

shadragon · Apr 3, 2012

Hi Martimus,

Exactly what I did, but found out from her after a week of rice bagging that she had tried to power it up several times before giving it to me so it is probably fried. Found a repair shop and we are getting it repaired for $300 with new parts installed and a 30 day warranty so satisfied with that.

If it survives the 30 days then we should be good to go. Well until she forgets it in her jacket again of course.

I have been thinking of this:

Liquipel | Waterproof Your Cell Phone, No Case Required!

Has anyone tried this kind of protection? I have an Otterbox case on mine, but this looks a lot more effective in their marketing materials...

Cheers.

jerofld · Apr 3, 2012

For $300, she might as well just get a new phone. There's no guarantee how long those repairs will last. Because it's not the water that causes the damage to cell phones. It's the sediment and other material in the water that causes shorts and corrosion on electrical contacts. So, unless that guy is pulling up every chip (with a very expensive/large/energy consuming machine) and cleaning all the pins under each processor, there's no guarantee if the repairs will be 100%. Which I doubt he's doing. I'm sure he's just giving the boards an alcohol bath and then using an air hose to blow out the alcohol, which should clear any sediment-causing shorts, but won't necessarily stop the corrosion.

valorian · Apr 3, 2012

jerofld said:
For $300, she might as well just get a new phone. There's no guarantee how long those repairs will last. Because it's not the water that causes the damage to cell phones. It's the sediment and other material in the water that causes shorts and corrosion on electrical contacts. So, unless that guy is pulling up every chip (with a very expensive/large/energy consuming machine) and cleaning all the pins under each processor, there's no guarantee if the repairs will be 100%. Which I doubt he's doing. I'm sure he's just giving the boards an alcohol bath and then using an air hose to blow out the alcohol, which should clear any sediment-causing shorts, but won't necessarily stop the corrosion.

I could not agree more with this. Unless the person repairing this phone is completely replacing each circuit board I would not trust this repair. I repair electronics for a living and I've seen what corrosion can do to electronics.

TheBrit · Apr 3, 2012

On the Liquipel story, they are talking to manufacturers to get this applied at the factory but it can also be applied to existing devices. I wonder what the cost will be...

shadragon · Apr 5, 2012

TheBrit said:
On the Liquipel story, they are talking to manufacturers to get this applied at the factory but it can also be applied to existing devices. I wonder what the cost will be...

According to their web site $59 - 79 depending on the level of service you want. Just click on BUY NOW and you can see the details.

One would think manufacturers would use this kind of thing before the phone leaves the factory, but then again if they did they would sell fewer phones.

Mostly Harmless · Apr 5, 2012

I would buy a new phone or even a used phone, the classifieds on this forum are pretty good I am sure you can find something to replace her phone for $300.

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