Bose Headphones "On," hence discharging, constantly.

DDA said:

And I left it out in the rain.

Click to expand...

Easy answer - you've already said it!! - electronics and water don't mix.

Stupid thing to do, buy a new one.

DDA said:

Greetings
What I've got is a Bose Quiet Comfort II model 35 (obsolete!!!)
And I left it out in the rain.
It now works fine EXCEPT....

It has two lights near the power jack. I think the red one, which blinks, means it is charging. The white one, I think, means it is "On." That one now comes on when I start charging and stays on till the battery is fully discharged. The battery charge doesn't last nearly as long as before the device's shower experience.

Question the First: What might be wrong?
Question the Second: Could it be fixed?
Question the Third: Could I fix it? [I'm a pretty good macro handyman; micro electronics manipulation or =gasp= soldering would be uncharted territory. [Yes, I spent my youth reading and acquiring vernacular from =shudder= "Li'l Abner.']

Bose themselves, you understand, will (or can) not answer those questions, even if begged or hounded. Their absolute bottom-line dead-end is that I may send in the 'phones and if they were still under warranty they would send me back the next model up; since they are not, they will send me back the next model up and bill me =gulp= $209.

TIA

Click to expand...

Water multiplies the capacitance of air between exposed conductors by a factor of 80 from the dielectric constant. High frequency DC-DC circuits don't like this. Exposed copper will rust. and cause resistance in the stray capacitance.
Some circuits are sensitive to that.

Solder masks add to signal capacitance to HF/RF, so rather than use solder mask some companies just used moisture detectors to void your std warranty that changed colour.


Keyboards and laptops are a common problem in the rain. If you don't have high velocity warm dry air to dehumidify, the best thing is put in a 10 kg bag of rice but not so convenient. But adequate for mobile phones.

Nigel Goodwin, how ever did you get declared "helpful?"

Tony Stewart,
Thanks for observances; somewhat enlightening even though I don't have the vocabulary to appreciate all of it. In practical terms, I left it to dry in the house and poured a (regular 1# or 2#) bag of rice over it. Certainly not immersion. Gave it a couple of days.
Result as reported. So would something rust that quickly? Any point in putting a hair dryer to it at this stage?

I suppose I'm still at the second and third questions in my first post.
If one could open the 'phones up and see some wires or a little board, would there be some element there that could be cleaned of rust (possibly by me) , or replaced (probably not by me---although I'm not bad at sweating copper pipes, I have no illusion that this translates to electronic soldering!), or something?

Thanks for your thoughtful attention to my post above.

Once a piece of electronics gets wet while it has power on, parts with moisture and voltage start to electrolyse, forming metal salt deposits on the surfaces - grey, brown or white "mould" like stuff.

That is conductive and also hydrophilic, like table salt or sugar; it will collect moisture from the air. The metal salts can also react with carbon dioxide in the air to form carbonates and "grow" over time.

The only way to cure such damage is to dismantle the device and clean off all such deposits using deionised water and then alcohol.
If the carbonate build up is bad (rather similar to limescale texture & not very soluble) that can be removed by scrubbing with white vinegar before extremely thorough rinsing with deionised water, then drying and washing with alcohol to absorb residual moisture.

That can work, as long as the short circuits caused have not destroyed parts and the corrosion has not already eaten away conductors or component pins.

The most critical thing is to remove power (e.g physically disconnect the battery) as soon as you realise anything has got wet. The longer it stays connected, the more damage occurs.

This is typical of what water ingress damage looks like:

ps. For anyone else reading this - putting phones etc. in rice to dry them is completely ineffective.

Dry rice is a reasonable desiccant, and the air between the grains will be very dry - but the moisture that must be removed is contained in a mostly sealed enclosure and with no airflow, it can take days for the moisture to migrate out of that casing - with the corrosion and damage worsening all the time...

If you cannot dismantle the item or immediately take it for repair, heat and airflow are the best ways to dry it out.

OK. Well, sounds like I might want to (delicately!) see if I can expose the works and try the alcohol sort of treatment. Or see if there is a shop or service around here that might try such a plan.
I take it the piece in the photo above is not meant to be taken to a shop, but rather dropped in the waters off Antikythera.

DDA said:

OK. Well, sounds like I might want to (delicately!) see if I can expose the works and try the alcohol sort of treatment. Or see if there is a shop or service around here that might try such a plan.
I take it the piece in the photo above is not meant to be taken to a shop, but rather dropped in the waters off Antikythera.

Click to expand...

You might struggle finding anyone, first off most engineers won't look at Bose gear, it's just cheap Chinese gear with a big profit margin, and no spares or service information available - and Bose are particularly unhelpful.

Then water damage?, it's usually impossible to perform a 'professional' repair, so again many won't bother as it just harms their reputation. You might get it working, but there's no guarantee it won't fail again in the fairly near future - corrosion continues, even where you can't see it.

The picture in post #6 is by no means the worst I've seen

Thanks. Much more informative.
Bose, indeed, was monumentally unhelpful.

I can of course, continue using the 'phones as is; charge just doesn't last as long. (So far)
I might take a careful look inside, supposing I can get in there (wonder if there is a YouTube video ) and see what I can see.

rjenkinsgb said:

ps. For anyone else reading this - putting phones etc. in rice to dry them is completely ineffective.

Click to expand...

Wish t'god this were universally understood. Think the rice is just too easy a meme.

Hi. Possibly last word.
If I do try looking within the works, perhaps I'm wanting to examine the physical on-off switch, since that or something around it, might be what is stuck "on?"

Otherwise all points taken; I know more than I did.
If I get anywhere, or don't, I'll try and report results.

Thank you.
'Nother question-----'nother thread.