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Repair information and guides for the fifth generation of iPhone. Model: A1387

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iPhone 4S (Not my own) dropped in water for 2 seconds

Hi my sister dropped her iPhone 4S in a bowl of cold water for about 2 seconds, she ran to me with the phone off and immediately dissasbled the phone down to the frame and using a hairdryer on cold removed the majority of the water (there wasn't loads).

I used a Qtip to ensure all connection ports were water free then placed all the vital components LCD housing, Logic board, camera, speaker compartment into an air tight tub with about 2-4 of those little Silica Crastal bags that you get as they absorb moisture. That was about 5 hours ago.

Given the iPhones short submersion plus what appeared to be minor traces of water and not loads, should I leave the iphone in the tub in pieces for about 3-4 days + then put it back together?

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Hi Matt,

Best thing to do in these cases to prevent corrosion in the future is to leave the motherboard in a alcohol based bath (at least 92% but preferably 96% or higher) These 96% alcohol bottles are usually sold by pharmacies for not too much.

Strip off the metallic chip casing and preferably use a toothbrush first with some of the alcohol to scrub the whole motherboard. After that you can safely fully submerge the motherboard into the alcohol and leave it there for at least 24 hours. After the 24 hours, get it out and heat it up just a little bit so that it dries and vaporates.

This will prevent the water from sticking there wich you would find out perhaps even after a week or 4 when it is too late.

Hope it helps, let us know :)

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Thanks Jessabethany and Kevin for the great answers I shall go ahead and do that and order a new battery and Kevin just to make sure; is the metallic chip on the logic board the EMI Sheild?

I shall post back with the results as soon as your suggested steps have been taken, thanks in advance too! :-)

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Yess mate, remove all the EMI shields because water will crawl in between there and you dont want it to sit there, the alcohol will get there eventually but its better to be sure and scrub it off yourself with a toothbrush and leave the shields off when bathing it in the alcohol for a while, at least leave it in for a hour or so to be sure, it cannot do any harm at all. I have seen phones not working when just treated with a toothbrush but started working when bathed in alcohol for a while. Good luck and please accept one of the answers so that other people know what to do when it happends to them! :)

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Get it out of that tub and into some isopropyl alcohol Matt!

You actually don't want the water to dry. You want to displace the water with alcohol, and THEN dry.

Great job skipping the rice though, you are on the right track.

You really don't need any kind of multi-day wait. Clean it like Kevin suggests with toothbrush and alcohol on the board. Clean all your connectors. Order a new battery (the battery itself has a little logic board and if that goes--it is dangerous.)

Air dry it under a warm light. Put it back together and test when you don't smell alcohol anymore.

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Hi Matt, I only commented because your last name is Allsop and mine is too and I thought that was really cool. Lol

What if we're related!? o.O (Which we probably are considering the rarity of the last name Allsop).

I dropped my iPhone in water today and found this (what a crazy coincidence!)

I'm really scared though - I got my iPhone only 3 months ago :(

Anyway, if you wanna contact me - my email is luxallsop@yahoo.com

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