LG VX8600 Cell Phone survives trip through washing machine

This seems like the best place to post this brief story.

A few weeks ago (beginning of March, 2008) I was doing laundry and during my first load of shirts I accidentally left my cell phone, an LG VX8600 in a shirt pocket. I didn't notice that I had done this until the load of shirts was completely finished--the washing cycle was done. And, since I have neither a land line nor a backup cell phone, I was pretty pissed off at myself and the circumstance and was envisioning having to shell out another few hundred bucks for yet another new phone--I'm already on my fourth in four years (three Motorola's and one LG). Arggghhhh.

The phone was in a leather carrying case with a buckle on it to attach to your belt, so the phone was protected somewhat by this, but still, my guess is that it was completely submerged for some large number of minutes and also experienced the agitator knocking it around.

At first it didn't work at all. I searched the internet a bit for other folks who have had a similar experience and found a few successful resuscitation stories. So I took the battery out of the phone and essentially tried to dry out the phone sans battery over the next couple days by letting it sit in a sunny window or over a heating vent.

Long story short, the drying out worked. The battery that went through the wash was completely hosed, but I had a spare battery, and after some fiddling around and some more drying out, the cell phone seems to be working at about 99%, and has been for about three weeks now. I can still make and receive calls, check my voice mail, use the tools like the alarm clock and so forth. The only thing that doesn't yet work is the "Power/End" key. But I've found that I can get by just fine without using that key anyway.

So my kudos go out to LG Electronics, manufacturer of the phone. I'd say that many electronic devices that are fully submerged and put through a wash cycle might very likely not ever work again, so it's a testament to some great manufacturing and some luck that this phone still works. THANK YOU LG ELECTRONICS! I'll very likely choose an LG product for future electronics needs because of this positive experience that saved me real $$.

By the way, I don't work for LG or any other cell phone manufacturer. I'm just a user who had a good/lucky experience.

UPDATE 4/5/2008: After the latest battery charging, the Power/End key now seems to be working again! Woohoo! So now the phone is working exactly as if it were brand new (plus it's CLEAN!).