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Help Sprint HTC Hero Disassembly DIY

klockk said:
Well what did you find out...?
My wife dropped her Hero in the toilet today.. (TWO Weeks OLD!!!)...:mad:
She said it continued to work for a while, then started acting as you described...

I have it apart now.....
I have her battery in MY phone.. it seems to be working okay....

I used compressed air to get rid of all the water I can find....
Hopefully this will do the trick and I can get her phone working again....

I figured you used the denatured alchohol to get rid of the sugar residue from your slush.... right? since this was water.. I'm inclined to not do that step... ??
Click to expand...


I got it dried out and back together.... BUT.....
When I plug it in to a USB Port... The Orange LED lights up.. Ok.. good so far...

When I power it up... on USB or Battery....
The LCD turns on, and short vibrate occurs....
... The LCD remains on for ~4 seconds (Displaying HTC)
then it turns off... for about 4 seconds.....
then on for 4 secs, and off for 4 secs...
It seems like it will do this forever if I allow it.... only way to stop it is to remove the battery....

Now What!?!?
 
klockk said:
Well what did you find out...?
My wife dropped her Hero in the toilet today.. (TWO Weeks OLD!!!)...:mad:
She said it continued to work for a while, then started acting as you described...

I have it apart now.....
I have her battery in MY phone.. it seems to be working okay....

I used compressed air to get rid of all the water I can find....
Hopefully this will do the trick and I can get her phone working again....

I figured you used the denatured alchohol to get rid of the sugar residue from your slush.... right? since this was water.. I'm inclined to not do that step... ??
Click to expand...

Based on my experience I would still wash the boards with denatured alcohol. Try not to take out the touchscreen or the LCD, your dust problems will get a lot worse (trust me). :-)

I have yet to lose a phone to water damage, from a Motorola I took in a hot tub to a LG I dropped in beer at a concert. Take it apart, wash it with alcohol and then get it as dry as possible. You may have some temporary spotting of the screen and you may need a new battery (once in my case) but IMHO that should fix it.

My phone is still working great, although in the past two days my SD card has stopped mounting and reports as broken, WTF? It's most likely the cheap ass microcenter one I have in there, we'll see.
 
autorail1 said:
I had lots of Dust under my screen in the lower left corner. ALL I DID WAS VACUUM ALL THE DUST OUT! Not one spec there.
Click to expand...
I also had dust in the lower left corner of the screen and a big shop vac sucked it right out. No disassembly required.
 
Crumm said:
I also had dust in the lower left corner of the screen and a big shop vac sucked it right out. No disassembly required.
Click to expand...

Seriously?? My dust farm is ever expanding and in the same location. I have a large shop vac. Did you do something magic with it? Or are you yanking everyone's chain?
 
matbob said:
Seriously??
Click to expand...

I am serious. It pulled about 80% of the dust out. I can see a tiny bit in the corner when the screen is black but once I turn it on I cant see any. I was a little nervous about sucking the silver button cover or trackball off but they seemed to stay put.
 
Crumm said:
I am serious. It pulled about 80% of the dust out. I can see a tiny bit in the corner when the screen is black but once I turn it on I cant see any. I was a little nervous about sucking the silver button cover or trackball off but they seemed to stay put.
Click to expand...

Cool! I am going to try this tonight. If I get ambitious I will take before/after photos.
 
matbob said:
Cool! I am going to try this tonight. If I get ambitious I will take before/after photos.
Click to expand...

Either I'm calling BS or your screen has a huge hole letting dust in if you can vacuum it out. I tried this idea with 0% improvement. Disappointing.
 
Damn. Great tutorial, although anyone attempting this needs to make sure they take their SD card out. It will break.

I was fortunate enough to remember to take out the card, and got it apart fairly easily. A microfiber cloth I use to clean my glasses took care of all dust, and I also made sure to dust out the circuit boards with a can of air.

But as luck would have it, I cracked the front of the LCD; I guess I used a little too much force while prying it out. The display still works perfectly and there is no bleeding, so I only cracked the thin glass in front of it (not the main screen). It's up in the corner and not too noticeable when the screen is on, but I traded an excruciatingly annoying amount of dust for an only slightly less annoying crack. Anyone know where I can buy a replacement LCD? The link provided earlier in the thread was just for the front screen cover/digitizer. I found an LCD on that site, but it's for the European Hero. :(
 
Electriophile said:
Damn. Great tutorial, although anyone attempting this needs to make sure they take their SD card out. It will break.

I was fortunate enough to remember to take out the card, and got it apart fairly easily. A microfiber cloth I use to clean my glasses took care of all dust, and I also made sure to dust out the circuit boards with a can of air.

But as luck would have it, I cracked the front of the LCD; I guess I used a little too much force while prying it out. The display still works perfectly and there is no bleeding, so I only cracked the thin glass in front of it (not the main screen). It's up in the corner and not too noticeable when the screen is on, but I traded an excruciatingly annoying amount of dust for an only slightly less annoying crack. Anyone know where I can buy a replacement LCD? The link provided earlier in the thread was just for the front screen cover/digitizer. I found an LCD on that site, but it's for the European Hero. :(
Click to expand...

OEM HTC Hero(GSM), HTC Hero 6250, HTC Sprint Hero LCD

Looks like it to me.
 
klockk said:
I got it dried out and back together.... BUT.....
When I plug it in to a USB Port... The Orange LED lights up.. Ok.. good so far...

When I power it up... on USB or Battery....
The LCD turns on, and short vibrate occurs....
... The LCD remains on for ~4 seconds (Displaying HTC)
then it turns off... for about 4 seconds.....
then on for 4 secs, and off for 4 secs...
It seems like it will do this forever if I allow it.... only way to stop it is to remove the battery....

Now What!?!?
Click to expand...

What happened, did you get it working? I did the same procedure today with a Samsung Instinct and so far it's working good.
 
Salinemist,

I dropped my hero into the tub. Anyway, how long did you wait for it to dry? I got mine apart but don't know how long I should wait. Its been 2 hours apart so far. Is you're 100% working? Thanks.
 
lobug said:
Salinemist,

I dropped my hero into the tub. Anyway, how long did you wait for it to dry? I got mine apart but don't know how long I should wait. Its been 2 hours apart so far. Is you're 100% working? Thanks.
Click to expand...

Did you clean the boards with something? Do you just have it sitting out or have you blown it with compressed air? Mine works 100%, no problems other than a cracked trim ring around the USB port where I dropped it on concrete. :-)
 
salinemist said:
Did you clean the boards with something? Do you just have it sitting out or have you blown it with compressed air? Mine works 100%, no problems other than a cracked trim ring around the USB port where I dropped it on concrete. :-)
Click to expand...

No its just sitting on the window sill apart. Didn't clean it with anything. Should I? I'll get a can of compressed air soon. Good to hear ur phones fine!
 
Sprint says they can't fix this but I'm sure it has to be fixable, right? Has anyone else had trouble with this and fixed it themselves? Any ideas?
Thanks.....
 
I know this sounds crazy. Put your phone in a bag of dry rice.. The rice will draw out the water here is a link to help you out.


How to Dry Out a Cell Phone - Fix a Wet Cell Phone - Popular Mechanics

hope this helps. :)


klockk said:
Well what did you find out...?
My wife dropped her Hero in the toilet today.. (TWO Weeks OLD!!!)...:mad:
She said it continued to work for a while, then started acting as you described...

I have it apart now.....
I have her battery in MY phone.. it seems to be working okay....

I used compressed air to get rid of all the water I can find....
Hopefully this will do the trick and I can get her phone working again....

I figured you used the denatured alchohol to get rid of the sugar residue from your slush.... right? since this was water.. I'm inclined to not do that step... ??
Click to expand...
 
Hey guys, my phone got wet in the rain a while back. So i took the battery out and dried it out. This is months later now and phone works except the power off button no longer works and the button lights stay on 24/7 now. Is there a way to atleast disable the button lights so they don't keep eating my battery life so fast? Any input would be greatly appreciated, thanks
 
vuser16 said:
I know this sounds crazy. Put your phone in a bag of dry rice.. The rice will draw out the water here is a link to help you out.


How to Dry Out a Cell Phone - Fix a Wet Cell Phone - Popular Mechanics

hope this helps. :)
Click to expand...

Also...don't throw out all the water-vapor-eating "dessicant" pouches or small plastic dessicant holders that come in the boxes with new electronics, televisions, cameras, etc. Keep them in a bag in your kitchen or someplace and pull them out for times like this!
 
jah8551 said:
im not sure if this was posted yet, but in step 2 you should put to remove sd card, i ruined my card trying to pull the housing cover off
Click to expand...

Same here, I re-read the instructions again and it's not there. It was an 8GB SanDisk too, bummer. Otherwise, a great post and I am sure glad it was there, I had major dust issues and lint was keeping the trackball and buttons from functioning properly.

For those who suggest silicone sealer... do y'all realize that you just permanently glued the screen in? You won't be able to disassemble it ever again.

To the guy who suggested a thin gasket around the perimeter... kudos, that would be proper fix.
 
Thanks to the original poster. I was able to disassemble, gently wipe w/a lint free cloth and reassemble in about 5 minutes. I would like to see someone 'solve' the recurrent dust problem and post a fix. Does it just need a better gasket between the glass and LCD frame?

Thanks again!

R.
 
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