Repairing a water-damaged LCD TV is difficult, and results vary based on the problem type, severity and location.When a television has water damage,
there is, unfortunately, not a whole lot that you will be able to do
yourself. You may find that a few different tricks will work and get
your television working again, but you may end up having to take it to a
professional repairman.Very often you have to hear questions from TV owners that are hard to give definitive answers.For instance.
What to do if you washed the LCD TV screen and now it does not show?
They sprayed liquid from the sprayer onto the display, it leaked down and now streaks and stains appeared on the screen. Can I repair ...?
In such cases, it is rather difficult to reassure, but there are repair options.
1. Replacing the LCD panel (matrix). Repair is expensive, commensurate with the price of a new TV.
2. Panel recovery. Such repair does not guarantee a successful result and depends on the degree of damage to the panel components (contacts, loops and other components). It should be borne in mind that the repair of the matrix (panel) is not practiced in all workshops and service centers.
If in earlier models, where fluorescent lamps used the backlight in the panels, contact cables to the glass were glued on top and water penetration down the glass did not cause such negative consequences, in recent years the situation has changed dramatically.
In modern models of LED-TVs, panel designs with a lower arrangement of loops, driver strips and the T-Con (Timing Controller) board are practiced. This allows you to make the TV as thin as possible from above, and place all the blocks in the lower part of the body. In this case, the shift of the center of gravity gives additional stability to the TV when using it with a stand.
But, when any liquid flows down the screen, it spreads along the bottom of the frame and can fill the contact joints of the cables with the glass. In this case, it is impossible to reconnect the glass.
But more often, the liquid flows through the loops immediately to the lower bars and destruction can occur in the connections of the cables to the contact pads of the bars, which can be restored. Usually, masters duplicate them with copper conductors, soldering to the surviving sections of contacts and tracks.
Three significant factors complicate the situation:1. Turning on the TV with flooded contact connections may cause the failure of the elements of the T-Con board.
2. Destruction progresses in time due to the onset of oxidative processes and literally corrodes the contacts and paths of loops, strips, as well as planar elements to which the liquid has got. Worse if you washed the screen not with water, but with a chemically active solution from the spray gun.
3. All damaged elements, including the T-Con board, are constituent components of the LCD panel assembly, are not separately supplied by manufacturers and are not commercially available. Also, there are no schematic diagrams in the documentation on the panel and sometimes it is impossible to determine the marking of damaged planar elements of the lower slats of the panel.
Tip for owners:
If after an unsuccessful attempt to wash the LCD TV screen the image disappeared or streaks appeared, you must immediately turn it off and get through to the workshop, where there are practical achievements in restoring the panels (matrices) to working. In half the cases, the result can be positive, if not delayed with such repairs. At the initial stage, the fracture is minimal if the fluid does not leak onto the inner surface and the glass contacts.
The faster the panel gets to the master, the greater the chance of a positive result.
If the recovery attempt fails, the panel must be replaced.
But in this case, there is another disappointing point. The price of a new panel can be 70-80% of the cost of the TV, so replacing it is usually unprofitable. Together with the cost of repair, the total amount in some cases may even exceed the price of a new TV.
Once again, we remind you that matrix repair was not initially provided for by their manufacturers. There are no instructions, diagrams, or components on sale for their repair. The experience of the masters and the availability of a spare parts warehouse from used TVs sometimes help to rectify the situation in one way or another. All initiatives and methods for restoring LCD panels come directly from the repairmen themselves based on personal experience.
In some cases, in some workshops, replacement of glass from another panel that is structurally similar to yours may be offered.
There are also other possible ways out of this situation, for example, you can sell a non-repairable TV for parts at a bargain price.
TV users and owners!
In order to safely clean the screen from dust and dirt, use special wet wipes, which are widely available.
The use of "freshly squeezed" rags does not guarantee protection against penetration down under the frame of the formed drops, which may not be immediately visible. Sometimes one drop is enough. Be careful!