Dropped your phone in water?

It was only submerged for a couple of seconds and as soon as I took it out of the water I was taking the back cover off to take out the battery, sim and memory card.

I wrapped the whole lot in a towel while I frantically googled what to do next, and here's what I did:

1) I submerged the whole phone in a bowl of dry, uncooked rice and left it somewhere warm. Rice should absorb/attract the water in the phone.

2) I got my vacuum cleaner and ran it over the phone (this should suck out some of the water, though some people argue that static from the vacuum cleaner can damage the phone)

3) put it back in the rice (apparently it's good to keep the container of rice air tight and to re-position the phone ocassionally)

I left it in the rice about 36 hours, though it's recommended to leave it for more.

Turning my phone back on the first time, it didn't work. It was dead.

I plugged a charger into the phone and the sony ericsson logo popped up for a couple of seconds.

I removed the battery and replaced it with a battery from an old sony ericsson t303 (I used some tape to tape little bits of straw on to the batter to make it fit)

MY PHONE WORKS.

I can make calls. I can send texts. I can connect to wifi. The screen works but areas are a bit 'washed out' in that they're not displaying the colour as vividly as the rest of the screen.

Haven't tried things like GPS yet, but will shortly.

If you drop your phone in water then you can try what I did. I can't guarantee it will work but you have nothing to lose.

Remember:

-take your battery out IMMEDIATELY the biggest danger is shorting the phone.

-do not try and turn on your phone until you have tried the "rice method" above, for a considerable amount of time.

-If it doesn't turn on afterwards try a charger/different battery.

If your phone falls in to salt water you can try rinsing it with fresh (preferably distilled) water before doing the 'rice method' and apparently rubbing alcohol will push water out. I have not tried either technique so can't recommend them. Salt water is worse for your phone as it transmits electricity better than fresh water and can corrode the inside of your phone.

Sorry if a similar thread has been made before but I'm just so happy and needed to share with someone!!!

Message 1 of 32

by: david72817281
on: 15/11/2011 | 19:43

Still if my phone fell into water I would get another 1 the phone would never be the same

Message 2 of 32

by: stealthybigboss
on: 15/11/2011 | 19:44

wow nice i dropped a phone only in a drop of water before and it broke lol

Message 3 of 32

by: stephenmiller
on: 15/11/2011 | 19:45

If you do drop your phone in water it the most essential things to dry are the metal connectors below the battery, if they corrode you are done for

Message 4 of 32

by: bilalmukhtar1
on: 15/11/2011 | 19:45

sup man, thanks this is really useful! i have used this technique before unfortunatly it did not work for me

but thanks so much for posting this keep the good community contribution coming, we look forward to seeing your next post!

Message 5 of 32

by: mozzyd15
on: 15/11/2011 | 19:47

i did the exact thing to my brother, who has the exact phone has you haha

he has a white sony ericsson xperia mini pro, and before that he used to have a xperia x10 mini pro,

same thing happened to both (water drops) and i used the exact same method. what do you know, 2 days later, perfect condition and now he uses them both hehe

Message 6 of 32

by: mitchell2010
on: 15/11/2011 | 19:48

i dropped my phone in water 4 days ago, all i did was quickly get a towel and dry the phone then took sim and battery out wiped battery and sim for 5 minutes, put them back in, everything was fine except my micro sd card which wasn't working which after i left in tissue for a night worked again perfectly. i must have been lucky

order a "hybrid" sim which can be used as a standard sim or can be pinched into a micro sim

Message 7 of 32

by: llyamah
on: 15/11/2011 | 19:56

Back in the day I had a Nokia 8310, which I thought (and it probably was) to be the absolute muts nuts. Anyway, that thing dropped in water more than once (and once down the loo) and it worked afterwards each time.

My top tip would be DO NOT TURN THE PHONE ON STRAIGHT AWAY - WAIT UNTIL YOU ARE SURE IT IS DRY!!! In fact, here's a funny story about that:

My now girlfriend (and then friend) got pushed into a paddling pool at university. She was as drunk as a sailor and tried turning the phone on straight away. I took it off her and didn't let her. She was crying and called her then boyfriend off of my phone telling him "llyamah is a poophead*". Quite amusing now and I still remind her of it now.

Secondly, to get it dry, I left mine in the airing cupboard. If it happened to me now, I would put it in a bowl of rice and then the airing cupboard. Or put a towel on the raidiator and leave the phone on top of that.

* Replace 'poophead' with swear word of your choice

Message 8 of 32

by: olidoo
on: 15/11/2011 | 19:58

This was on the Scott Mills Show,

Done it, and it worked mighty fine

Message 9 of 32

by: 7percent
on: 15/11/2011 | 20:02 - edited: 15/11/2011 | 20:06

My phone is working perfectly at the moment. Perhaps there's some damage I can't see and maybe it will die in a few weeks but as it is I'm just chuffed it's functioning at all. Especially as I have no insurance etc.

I think I might invest in some silica gel as apparently it's a lot better than rice and use it next time one of my family or myself drops a phone/camera/mp3 player etc in water.

I hope my experience helps you guys out if you're ever in the same situation. Though obviously please try not to drop your phone in the first place.

Message 10 of 32