Heat and humidity

Hi everyone! First of all I’m not a technician. I have a FP3. On my last summer holidays it was giving me a lot of trouble. The screen was often times shaking or frozen so I couldn’t use it properly and was always afraid to loose it completely. I was traveling in a hot and tropical climate. I guess the issues are related to the climate because when I came back to cold weather the phone worked well again. In a few weeks I’ll be going back to the tropical heat :slight_smile: Do you have any recommendations on how to protect my phone? I will need it daily to write messages, call, for navigation and for taking pics… Thanks so much in advance!

Hi and welcome to the forum.

First you may want to check the screen contacts are good, pressing the edges of the screen just below centre on the right can help.

Disassembling and reassembly may further help.

One further advantage of removing the screen is you can see the dampness indicators. This was my first concern on reading your post.

Warm tropical air usually has a high level of moisture, which will get into the phone and in time that can aid corrosion of the contacts and more. However of a more immediate concern is that taking a ‘humidified’ phone to a colder clime will result in moisture condensing in the phone. If you then go again to a warm climate not only will the phone absorb more moisture form the air, but the ‘water’ inside will evaporate and increase the total volatile internal moisture.

If you remove the screen there are test ‘squares’ to say if the moisture content has got significant enough that it voids the warranty.

So apart from pressure on the contacts or cleaning and avoiding ‘corrosion’ you may like to keep a drying agent near the phone. Silica gel come in little packets you can keep near the phone.

Whatever ensure there is always a good airflow around the phone especially when travelling from one clime to another.

There’s a video in the following that shows how to get the screen off.

Red square

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Have a look round the Forum. Search for “humidity” for example.
In addition to amoun’s advice I would insist on precautions: avoid abrupt changes in temperature, keep in an airtight bag with sachet of silica gel etc.
I put some ideas here.

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BTW take care here. Moisture is a thing that can kill your phone sooner or later (and you won’t notice until it is too late), see how I “lost” my FP3:

The iFixit article linked there is also very good and shows what you can really do (and no putting into rice does not really help) in case of water damage like this one.

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This idea may be fine but silica gel (SiO2) is questionable, in it’s longevity and effectiveness, before it is de-hydrated.

If you go swimming you can get waterproof bags to put the phone in, good for the sandy beach too.

However if the phone already has moisture in it from a high humidity I wouldn’t place it in a plastic bag, even with SiO2, unless there’s lots of it and it’s ‘dry’

Unless you regularly buy. dry SiO2, you may want to de-hydrate it in an oven around 120°C to 130°C for a minimum of 1 hour. Better at 145°C

With a ‘high’ temperature 30°C, SiO2 is not that effective, as any water in it may evaporate. To avoid that you would ideally weigh the SiO2.

Here is a discussion on an alternative, not that it’s an easy alternative. Even common salt will absorb moisture from the air. The Calcium chloride is very similar and should not contact metals due to it’s corrosive nature.

SiO2 is rather benign in use.

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