Hi,
I came about this piece. It is in Spanish, so I have used DeepL to translate the important parts. I used *bold* in the important paragraph but I'm not sure it will work.
David Calvo, mobile repair technician: "If your smartphone gets wet, never leave it in rice and then charge it"
Liquid damage can destroy a mobile phone, but an expert tells us what to do in such a situation.
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This situation, which is very common, can end up with the user having to buy a new phone or simply having to repair their own. And there are certain actions that facilitate the repair is possible and, moreover, that is not expensive. In EL ESPAÑOL - El Androide Libre we have talked to David Calvo, mobile repair technician at MovilSolution.
This expert tells us what we should do when we drop our mobile phone in the water, where we should not submerge it under any circumstances and also what to avoid in the first minutes after immersion, such as trying to charge it. The latter is very important if we want to minimise the loss of the phone and, above all, the data inside it.
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Putting the phone in rice, in theory, is not bad, and can help a little, but the problem is that, according to the expert, "people leave them in rice for one or two days and then charge them immediately afterwards. This is something that should never be done. This is a problem because ‘as long as there is any water or humidity, no electrical current should be applied to the motherboard, which is where the charger is connected’.
When in doubt about how to proceed, David explains that in reality it is not even necessary to put it in rice, that the best thing to do is to take it to a technical service centre, as that is where the necessary tools are available to eliminate the humidity and water. Nor is it advisable to ‘hit it with a hairdryer to remove the liquid, that doesn't work’. Even if the phone is working well, it is possible that the fault may occur when it is being charged.
How to remove moisture
With this in mind, it is taking it to a service centre that can save the phone, as this is where they can use the *ultrasound machine with a special liquid that displaces the water* inside the phone. The strategy is to immerse the phone in a liquid that moves the water away from the circuitry.
*The key is that this liquid (isopropyl alcohol or distilled water) is not capable of transmitting current, it is not conductive, as water is, so even if it is submerged there is no risk to the device*. This is similar to what we saw with OPPO's submerged servers at its Shenzhen headquarters. That's why it's important to clean the water as soon as possible, so that it doesn't have time to corrode the smartphone's metal internals.
In addition, there are cases where there are moisture problems even if the phone has not been submerged. It is possible that the damage has been caused by being in a very humid environment, such as a bathroom. This is something that technicians can detect by looking ‘at the internal moisture sensor of the phone, which is black but turns red when it has detected moisture’, as shown in the picture above.
Damage and fixes
Once the problem has been identified, it is sometimes feasible to clean the elements and get the phone working again. Or, if we have been very proactive, just by cleaning with the ultrasound machine we can solve it, and this is one of the most economical repairs, as David points out. But on other occasions it is necessary to take them to laboratories.
In that case the cost of repair is higher, and may even involve having to replace certain parts. If, for example, the screen connector is damaged, "it can involve replacing the entire part, which is one of the most expensive parts in today's mobile phones. In fact, many wet phones have to have the screen replaced. The cost of a cleaning is not high and David does not indicate that the normal cost is "around 20 or 30 euros, something that if you have to do something else I don't even charge. Of course, changing the parts can be much more expensive because it depends on the model, the part, but a repair can cost around 80 or 100 euros". And here is where you also have to take into account ‘the data, because it is something that people don't value until they lose it, and most of them don't have backups.’ This shows that in these situations it's worth paying for that cleaning and drying cycle to try and prevent having to replace parts soon after, especially if it affects the screen.
Translated with DeepL.com (free version)
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https://www.elespanol.com/elandroidelibre/moviles-android/20250509/david-calvo-tecnico-reparar-moviles-smartphone-moja-jamas-dejes-arroz-pongas-cargar-despues/1003743734572_0.html>
-- Cheers, Carlos E.R.
About repairing wet phones