Every year, Britons drop 850,000 phones down the toilet at a cost of over £300 million.
In this Dial-a-Phone tutorial, Jon Tickle, star of Big Brother and Brainiac explains what to do the next time your phone takes a swim!
http://youtube.com/watch?v=XwU_wSZVrf0
Cheers Jon, very helpful!
So just to recap then…
Here’s the full transcript of the video.
Every year, Britons drop 850,000 phones down the toilet! At a cost of over £300 million!
Next time this happens to you, don’t fret, and don’t worry about the buzzing and hissing, use our simple guide to nurse your phone back to full health!
Now different people swear by different methods of resurrecting a mobile phone, so were going to test three methods and see which one works best…the fridge method, the alcohol method, and the window method!
And for our experiment we’re going to use three identical Nokia 6230s, and some wee!
Obviously make sure you fish it out as soon as possible, you can always wash your hands later!
Immediately take the battery off. Electricity and water do not mix! Many circuits inside the phone will survive immersion in water provided they are not attached to a power source when wet.
Then take the sim card out! Your contacts may well be the most important part of your phone. The sim card actually survives water damage very well, so best just to take it off and leave it to dry.
Now here’s a little tip, if you happen to have gone for a swim with your phone in the sea for example, but don’t do it if you have dropped the phone into clean water. Briefly immerse your phone into deionised, or distilled water. This is to clean the phone of the impurities in the water, such as the salt in the sea which is corrosive and will damage the inside of the phone.
First pat the phone down with a paper towel to get off as much of the excess water as your can.
Now the phone needs to properly dry out. The important thing is to be patient and to let the water dry out at an even rate. Do not stick the phone in the oven, in a microwave or under a hairdryer as excessive heat will just cause more damage to the phone. We’re going to test three different methods here, the fridge, the alcohol and the window.
Now it might seem a bit silly sticking your phone in the fridge, but they say a fridge apparently acts like a dehumidfier, and will dry the phone out nice and evenly.
Again, it sounds a bit daft soaking your phone with alcohol, but strong alcohol will displace water and sediments and will dry out quickly with little residue.
And finally we’re going to try a slightly more sensible method, leaving the phone in a gentle flow of air, such as by a window, or that found on top of a tv, or a computer monitor for example.
Now be patient! Leave it for a day, and don’t try to turn it on! Better to be without a phone for a day than to have to buy a new one.
Ok, so lets test the alcohol method, put the battery back in, try and turn the phone on, and… nothing! Oh dear!
Right, onto the fridge, that’s nice and cold, stick the battery in, and again, absolutely nothing.
And here’s our phone by the window, stick the battery in, turn it on, and, oh yes, its working!
There’s all the proof you need! The best way to recover a phone you’ve dropped down the loo, is to dry it out by an open window.
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6 Comments
Just to say that I got a Nokia 6300 for Christmas 2008 and then dropped it down the toilet. I retrieved it out of the toilet as quickly as possible but it was wet and had hit the bottom of the toilet with a bit of impact, the back of the phone had come off and the battery had come out.
I put the phone back together and tried to switch the phone on but no luck, just got the blue lights at the side come on. Apparently this is a big no no, you shouldn’t try to switch the phone on but I didn’t know this.
I then took the back off, took the battery and SIM out and laid all the pieces out close to a low heat radiator. After 2 days of drying out, I reassembled the phone and it switched on, it came on and seemed to be working but the screen had lines through it. I took the phone apart again and after another 2 days of letting it dry out when I put it back together and switched it on it worked perfectly, no lines, no obvious damage and it still seems to be working.
So, my advice is:
1. Retrieve the phone from the water as quickly as possible
2. Don’t try to switch the phone on
3. Take the phone apart and let it dry out for 3 – 4 days by putting the pieces near a low, dry heat source
4. Reassemble the phone and hope that, like me, you are lucky enough for it to still work!
Two big no no’s are:
1. Don’t try to switch the phone on after it has been dropped in to water!
2. Don’t attempt to dry the phone out quickly with a direct high heat source, e.g. a hairdryer, this will just cause damage to the phone.
Another tip I had given to me was to put the phone in a bowl of rice grains as the rice absorbs the moisture from the phone but I didn’t try this so don’t know if it works.
Sorry its a nokia 6300 and everytime i switch it on it flashes and stays blue on the side but doesnt start up. I may have switched it on twice when it was still watterlogged. However i think after 3 mnths the toilet water must have dried naturally. Please dont suggest i buy a new phone. No cash. PS: nokia 6300 the one wit da silver covering
Hey what if the toilet water dried a long time ago in the phone
but what if you just been for a poo poo and you get cleggers on the phone?
“Every year, Britons drop 850,000 phones down the toilet” – i dont get it! how?? thats an awful lot of phones being dropped in poo.. so lets see, they pop in the toilet and sliiiiiippp, phones in the toilet. lol hilarious!
simple and useful technique. thanks, in case I will drop it I know what to do