FP2 won't turn on

[Arran_Bouten]

Hi all,

I’ve had my FP2 for a year and I’m having some issues with it turning on.

Sunday Jan 5 - Went for a hike and the phone got a small amount of water on it. It wouldn’t turn on for an hour but then it did and was working normally.

Tuesday Jan 14 - Turned off at some point overnight and wouldn’t turn on despite it still being around 70% battery. I tried it with multiple charges at power outlets and in a computer with no charge and charging light. Approx. three hours later it turned on by itself, got to the Fairphone loading screen and flickered to a purple stripy glitchy screen and turned off. A few minutes later it turned on and was working with about 50% battery.

Wednesday Jan 15 - All good

Thursday Jan 16 - Turned off at some point overnight. Turned it on, it had about 40% but turned off after 5 minutes. Haven’t been able to turn it back on since. Plugging it into multiple chargers hasn’t done anything and no charging light appears. I have tried some suggestions from this thread (FP2 Won't turn on or charge - See first post for troubleshooting) including removing the battery and the screen (no change), and removing the battery, plugging in the charger and then putting the battery back in (red charging light flickered on for 30 seconds then went off). Then, right before I was about to post here, I tried turning it on again and it worked and was charging.

Sunday Jan 19 - It had been working fine for three days then it turned off randomly. When I went to turn it back on the Fairphone screen came up then faded away slowly with a purple tinge to it. Since then, I’ve tried the same things as before but it hasn’t stayed on longer than a few second.

tl;dr - Possible water damage, phone won’t stay on.

Any ideas? Is it water damage from two weeks ago coming back with a vengeance? Thanks for the help!

Arran

[robbert.f]

It sounds as though the device either has some bad contacts, or it could still be shorting out somewhere - which may mean it still has moisture in it. Take the phone apart (up to and including step 10) and let the parts air dry separately. Check for any moisture damage.

Now, I think there may be two things going on here: a faulty battery/battery connection and a faulty screen connection. If you’re lucky, it’s just a screen thing - but the red LED makes me think otherwise.

Give the brass contacts on the screen and the pins they connect to a thorough cleaning with some isopropyl alcohol on a cotton bud. Do the same for the battery contacts. When the contacts are clean, put the phone back together and see if things improve. If it doesn’t want to turn on, try carefully flexing the phone, or applying pressure from the back right beneath the camera and see if the screen comes back on.

If it doesn’t, a battery replacement may be in order, though the only way to be sure is to try a different battery. Check if there’s any #fairphoneangels near you so you can swap parts (including the screen) out and determine what the problem is.

[Arran_Bouten]

Hi frm,

Thanks for the advice. I’ll give it a go!

It turned on a few minutes ago, I got to the app menu but it froze and faded away with a purple tinge and then had purple lines for a few seconds before turning off again.

Unfortunately, I’m in Australia so it doesn’t look like there are any angels around.

[Arran_Bouten]

Hey rmf,

I did the above a week or so ago and it seems to be working perfect.

Thanks heaps for the advice!