FP3: Black screen after drop, not charging

[jenz]

Dear forum,

My FP3 (/e/OS) seems to be dead, I would be glad to receive some hints from the community in order to troubleshoot (and hopefully fix) the issue. The display remains black, it does not seem to boot, and not to charge either.

What happened:
I was using the phone as flashlight when I accidentally dropped it (about 30cm on floor tiles). The LED was still lit when I picked it up. When I wanted to turn the light off one minute later, I noticed that the display could not be activated. I tried long-pressing the power button (to force a reboot) but nothing happened (LED still lit), so I took out the battery for 10s and reinserted, LED off but the phone did not boot.
When plugging it into a charger, the status LED remains dark.

What I already tried:

• disassembling the display and the bottom module, making sure all screws are tight. But that did not help either.
• Hold down Power and Volume Down, but it did not boot into FastBoot.

My problem:
As the phone seems to be 100% dead, I cannot tell whether it could be fixed by replacing some part of the phone, and which one. I’d be happy for any ideas how I could track the issue down.

Thanks a lot in advance

[anon9989719]

Hi and welcome to the forum

The first idea is to dismantle again, but do not do the screws very tight and ensure you do the ones by the display/core connector first.

This connector has ‘pogo’ pins on the core/main module, ensure they are all pressable and none are stuck. Clean the contacts a bit if you can.

Next search for a #fairphoneangel near you that may be able to help.

[jenz]

@anon9989719 Thanks for your response and your suggestions, great ideas. I did as you suggested, sadly it didn’t help. The pogo pins seem to be alright - I cleaned them and made sure to tighten the surrounding screws first. The issue remains the same.

I checked the angels map (what a nice institution ) - unfortunately there are no angels nearby my area.

[anon9989719]

Hi sad to hear about the problem.

Do you know anyone with an FP3 where you can test the battery, it may not be charged, you could also check using a volt meter.

There is always the option of dismantling the phone completely following the iFixit guide.

Is the phone two years old and out of warranty ?

Fairphone 3 Teardown

[jenz]

Hi @anon9989719 , thanks again for your helpful answer.

Is the phone two years old and out of warranty ?

Well, while my phone is less than two years old, I don’t expect any warranty to come up for me dropping the phone on the floor.

Do you know anyone with an FP3

In fact, my partner uses an FP3 too. Swapping batteries didn’t help, so tried some more. (I was hesistant to take a functional device apart, but afterhaving practiced a lot with my own in the last days, so I finally did… ) So, I also swapped the display module and the bottom module, always with the same result. My phone remained dead, my partner’s still worked fine.

So I assume that the issue is somewhere in the main module, which - as far as I understand - cannot be replaced. It seems I need to get myself a new phone

Thanks again for your help in analyzing the issue, I highly appreciate that.

[anon9989719]

@jenz

cannot be replaced

Support will replace the main module at a cost, however it may be possible to buy a reburbished phone from Fairphone at a reduced price and have spare modules including a battery.

Here’s an FP3 with 2 years warranty
https://shop.fairphone.com/en/fairphone-3-refurbished

There’s no knowing what the failure is but the repair centre is likely to consider the core module

Core module repair

Fairphone 3(+): Repair Price list and FAQ Cordon Repair Center

[jenz]

Thanks so much @anon9989719 . I contacted Fairphone support, let’s see what they respond.
Consider this thread resolved