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Repair information and guides for the iPhone 6 that was released on September 19, 2014. Model Numbers: A1549, A1586, and A1589

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Can't sign into phone following water damage

My wife's iPhone 6 went for a little swim over the labor day weekend. It was underwater for nearly a minute. Oh and did I mention this was saltwater? Yup, that too. We tossed it in a ziploc with some rice and I ordered a disassembly kit. The kit arrived Sunday and so after 6 days in rice I took the phone out, blew out any rice residue and plugged it in. To my shock and delight it worked...kinda sorta. The battery doesn't appear to hold a charge, the speaker doesn't work and the vibrator doesn't work. We also could sign in with the passcode - it would just bounce us back to the log-in screen. I also couldn't get the phone to be recognized by our PC. With nothing to lose and much to gain and went about taking it apart following the iFixit guides. One I had the battery, speaker logic board, camera and vibrator out I set about giving everything a good cleaning in some isopropyl alcohol. I let everything dry overnight and put Humpty Dumpty back together again.

The good news: the vibrator and speaker work. Also the lightning bolt charging indicator is appearing again.

The bad news: the software part seems to still be buggy. We enter our passcode and it kicks us right back to the login screen. Also did a forced reset to no avail.

Any ideas???

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Chris, next time skip the rice right, it is the worst myth around to use rice for any device that got submerged. Using rice is about the same as doing nothing, it does not do anything. The very first thing you want to do is to not try to restart/sync the phone. This may further damage your phone. The next thing to do is to clean it. Disassemble your phone using these guides. You must remove all the EMI shields of the logic board. If you do not remove those you are not cleaning 3/4 of the board. Clean everything with +90% (no less than 90%) isopropyl alcohol. Follow this guide, and even so it was written for a 3G all the points are still pertinent to your phone. Pay particular attention to the SMD components, check for charred missing or broken missing. You can then dry the board in an oven or equivalent at 220deg F (not higher;-) for a few hours. Best way to clean it would of course be through an ultrasonic cleaner. Consider professional help with that When it is properly cleaned, replace the battery. It is possible that it does not recognize your passcode and henceforth sends you back to the login screen. Once cleaned and the battery replaced, start by trying a DFU reset (you will most likely lose your files) and see what it gives you.

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Chris will be eternally grateful.
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