Recovering Moldy Electronics? 512
cookiej writes "We just completed having our basement gutted and our house decontaminated from mold. The finished basement is gone, my office floor has been removed as well as 24' of drywall around the base of the room. So, we had a full home theater downstairs along with a couple of computers in the electronics closet that were completely immersed (rainwater, not sewage). We moved them to a sheltered area outside and covered them with a plastic tarp. Since the electronics were off when the water hit them, 1) do I have a chance of recovering them? 2) If so, is there a way to clean them with some sort of liquid bath that would not damage the electronics? and 3) I don't want to bring moldy pieces back in the clean house. How could I decontaminate the electronics themselves, pre-bath? Not looking to save the speakers, just the amp, DirecTV box, video switch, etc. Thanks for any help, here, Slashdot." Read on for more details of this reader's plight.
Early last month, we had about 10" of rain in the course of two hours. Many houses in our neighborhood were damaged. We had rainwater coming in our back door and cascading down the basement steps. We have two sump pumps that weren't keeping up (and of course, no battery backup) and as the water rose in the basement, it was getting dangerously close to the breaker panel. So I made the hard decision to shut down the main power and we got the hell out.
The water reached about 6' in the basement before it drained out. Once we got back, we could not move fast enough to get all the debris out before mold set in and boy did it.
Since we are not in a flood plain, our insurance for this is woefully inadequate. While I would love to just go out and buy replacements, there are far more pressing things to re-buy (washer/dryer, furnace, water heater, etc.) and if there is a chance I can salvage some of this it might be a nice change of luck.
Oh man (Score:5, Funny)
Ethanol (Score:5, Funny)
Copious quantities of ethanol will help, possibly in more ways than one. :)
Um? (Score:4, Funny)
Re:I'd try... (Score:2, Funny)
Your Walgreens sells good beer? Maybe I should give them another chance.
I'm confused about the 91% part. I'm also confused about beer not leaving a residue.
Re:Um? (Score:3, Funny)
I agree. It's the only way to be sure.
Re:I'd try... (Score:4, Funny)
Re:There is hope (Score:5, Funny)
[bender]"Heheheheh... Lightweights! Oh, wait... Chlorine."[/bender]
Re:dunking electroncis whole is a bad idea (Score:5, Funny)
Apparently, you found more water after turning the power back on.
Re:There is hope (Score:5, Funny)
This chemical can has cheezburger
There, fixed that for you.
Easiest Solution (Score:3, Funny)
The easiest solution, of course, is to go back in time before the flood and get everything out of the basement.
Rice (Score:3, Funny)
In addition to the above stated solutions, you might speed the drying process with rice.
Re:There is hope (Score:5, Funny)
Let me add my own experience too, wait a long time for the electronics to dry. Once it looks *completely* dry, wait one more year. Then in 2010, turn the stuff upside down, and repeat the process. In 2011, set it on its one side. In 2012, the other side. God help you if your stuff has more faces than a hexahedron!
Re:There is hope (Score:1, Funny)
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you -> |
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btw, it's spelled meniscus.
Re:There is hope (Score:4, Funny)
Are you reading the same two posts the rest of us are?
GGP: "you will see a miniscus"
GP: "it's spelled meniscus".
Now sing with me, "One of these things is not like the other..."
Re:There is hope (Score:3, Funny)
Careful with that, because I had a co-worker who actually did this with a laptop (his dog peed on it). He left it in for a while, then turned the oven off. He left the laptop in to cool down. His wife came home and thought, "Hey, I'll make a frozen pizza for dinner! I better preheat the oven..."
I think you can all figure out how the story ends.
Re:There is hope (Score:5, Funny)
Don't listen to him. I work for a major soup manufacturer. I recommend putting lots of soup in your dishwasher. Also, fill your car's gas tank with soup. (This is called "souping up" your car. All the real car lovers do it.) And why not buy an extra 100 cans of soup per week with your grocery shopping? Too much soup is never enough. BUY MORE SOUP.
Re:There is hope (Score:3, Funny)
I think I'd be more concerned that a dog peed on my laptop.
In fact, scratch that. I'd be more upset that a dog peed on my laptop and I just put dog pee in my oven. Mmmmm... urine soaked roast turkey... mmmm...
Re:There is hope (Score:3, Funny)
Re:There is hope (Score:3, Funny)
So you're saying that if I lived in Florida, I *can* use my clothes drier to get the wet off my electronics? Neat!
It's pretty humid here. I'm going to go throw my water-damaged laptop into the dryer for a few hours.
Poo stains on the backseat of my car... (Score:1, Funny)
After an interesting match of chess played on the backseat of my car, there are now some horrible poo stains on the light fabric of the seat. How can I get these off?
Please spare me the jokes: I learned the lesson, and from now on will only play chess in the chess club [rochadereine.com], not in the backseat of my car.
Re:There is hope (Score:5, Funny)
Just stop, before you end up adding parentheses and reimplementing Lisp.