Don’t Throw Out That Drowned Phone

Posted on by ben

Have you had that moment yet?  That sickening feeling when your phone is flipping down out of your hands towards the water.  You are helpless to do anything.  We have become so dependent on our phones that some of us consider them a necessity.  Personally, I feel naked without my phone….and not the good kind of naked.  Now, I’m not one of those people who can’t maintain a conversation because I’m checking my Facebook.    But I do need to be able to check my email when the need arises.

So today I’m giving away a free tip that may save some of you several hundreds of dollars in replacing that drowned phone.  I was recently given a drowned Galaxy Nexus by a coworker.  He had dropped it in the Atlantic Ocean while fishing.  He retrieved it but it would not power on.  He tried many things himself including blow dryer, rice, and silica gel…but nothing worked.  So he gave it to me for parts.  He know that I’m always tinkering with electronics.

Well, I wasn’t ready to admit defeat.  I did a little research and came up with a method to try.  It sounded crazy…but I figured I had nothing to lose.  The procedure is below:

  1. Take the back off of the phone and remove the batter, sim card, and SD card.
  2. Get a container large enough to submerge the phone completely
  3. Get some alcohol (no we aren’t drinking).  You need 99% Isopropyl Alcohol.  I got mine from Walgreens.
  4. Soak the phone.  Place it in the container and add enough alcohol to submerge it.
  5. Watch some Tv – You’ll need to let it soak for a while…I waited an hour.
  6. Remove it from the alcohol and let it dry
  7. Reassemble and Power it On

Now, technically you don’t even need to dry it out since the alcohol doesn’t conduct electricity but it made me feel better.  I took the dry phone out and put it back together.  Held the power button and……….Voila!!!!  Yep, I had power and a working Galaxy Nexus.

Now this story doesn’t end completely happy.  The guy who gave it to me tried to fix it himself before he gave it to me and he damaged the internal antenna.  So it isn’t any good as a phone but the wifi works and my son loves it to play games on.

There you have it.  Anyone else tried a different method?

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