Water Damaged Mobile Phones – Dropping your mobile phone or similar device into water used to be the kiss of death for your device.

Fortunately there are a couple of ways to hopefully repair your device cheaply.

The first is the recently produced kits, such as revivaphone, which claim to repair 90% of water damaged phones.

If 15 quid is  more than you want to spend, then I am going to let you into a trade secret that I have been using for a few years to repair mobile phones and two-way radio equipment.

Electrical Switch Contact Cleaner, which can be bought for a few pounds at your local hardware shop is designed to be sprayed on electrical and electronic components.

First you ideally need to take the back off the device, so that you can see the circuit board.

Spray the circuit board liberally with the electrical contact cleaner so that it is soaked.

Leave the mobile phone in a warm place for a couple of days, with the phone at 90 degrees to the table, so the excess liquid can drain, as well as evaporate.

It would be useful to put a piece of kitchen roll underneath the phone to absorb any excess cleaner.

I have used this technique for a few years to repair water damaged mobile phones & radios, and it has worked for me, however I offer no guarantees, and accept no liability for damage that you may incur as a result of trying this.

Craig Miles (c)2014

For business use, we have a better alternative to mobile phones, called POC.

POC stands for PTT Over Cellular, and gives you the instant communication of a traditional handheld two-way radio, with the national or even international coverage of a mobile phone.

POC uses the mobile phone data service to send and receive voice calls.

POC is a great solution, but is not always the best solution for all events and scenarios.

For example for outdoor festivals, traditional two-way radios, with temporary repeater networks are often better.

This is because POC relies on the data service of the mobile phone network.

During festivals and concerts the audience want to take photos and videos, and put them on social media.

If you have 1000s of people all trying use the mobile phone network at once, then it can become overloaded, and not work well.

This is a potential issue for POC, as it can prevent important communications between the festival staff, using POC.