Coffee-Flavored HOTAS Warthog

[Blaze]

Spilled coffee all over my Warthog throttle this morning while rushing to leave for work. Coffee was seeping into cracks, switches and open vents. I got most of it sopped up with a towel, but that was the best I could do before being late for work. After stressing about it all day I come home and surprisingly everything still works perfect. Oh, and it now smells like Colombian roast coffee. I'm okay with this, just so long as it continues to work! What a day.

 

What a robust piece of equipment! Anyone have any similar stories of near-death experiences with their flying gear? :D

[MTFDarkEagle]

Hehe yes it is robust!

 

My story: my laptop. I know, not flightgear but still. While on school, not entirely awake yet :D Spilt one of those BIG cups of cappuchino on my HP DV6 laptop.. In a total panic moment shut it down, removed the battery and grabbed paper towels to *try* and clean it. After the coffee stopped oozing out of the USB, ethernet and VGA ports I pulled out the harddrive, which to my great relief survived. Brought the laptop to a cleaning company (for laptops that it :D) and they cleaned the motherboard. AMAZINGLY it survived!! The only thing that hasen't is those touch sensitive sound controls.. But hey, after a LARGE cup of coffee, not too bad :D

[Blaze]

Nothing like a heart attack to start your morning! :P

[MTFDarkEagle]

Aye I did have a mini heart attack :D

[diveplane]

Spilled coffee all over my Warthog throttle this morning while rushing to leave for work. Coffee was seeping into cracks, switches and open vents. I got most of it sopped up with a towel, but that was the best I could do before being late for work. After stressing about it all day I come home and surprisingly everything still works perfect. Oh, and it now smells like Colombian roast coffee. I'm okay with this, just so long as it continues to work! What a day.

 

What a robust piece of equipment! Anyone have any similar stories of near-death experiences with their flying gear? :D

 

rule number one never have fluids near a pc desk or electronics

[Cali]

rule number one never have fluids near a pc desk or electronics

 

+1, that's just asking for trouble.

[Megagoth1702]

rule number one never have fluids near a pc desk or electronics

 

Yep. Either that or whenever you OPEN a bottle of anything, make sure to roll away like 1-3 feet haha.

[Emmer]

Thats like going to the toilet and forget to take your wired headset off; you can imagine what happened next: the whole system went down, literally....:D

[WarthogSmurf]

Well nothing still happend with the stick but i once forgot to close the window and it suddenly was storming all night and i was stuck at work. I came home and my laptop (IBM still) was soaked . I litterally poored the water out , dried it .. next day turned it one and voila worked ...IBM best laptops evers same it is gone =)

[Lange_666]

After stressing about it all day I come home and surprisingly everything still works perfect.

 

If it was not plugged in or your PC had been shut down prior to the coffee spill you shouldn't worry to much about electronics being soaked. Just make sure everything is dry before you put the power back on and it should be working without any problems again.

[SmokeyTheLung]

My Warthog (joystick) drank a beer once. Seemed fine after I cleaned it with a towel, but it became sticky a day or so later... Had to disassemble and actually clean it.

 

No more beer on the desk! Although I don't think the real problem was that beer, but the two beers before it :D

[Rusty_M]

My dog once knocked an entire glass of Irn Bru over a cheap keyboard of mine. My desk is somewhat winged, and she got her nose under a wing and lifted her head.

 

The keyboard did not survive, and I replaced it with a much more expensive one. Perhaps that was asking for trouble.

[Cedaway]

Hehe yes it is robust!

 

My story: my laptop. I know, not flightgear but still. While on school, not entirely awake yet :D Spilt one of those BIG cups of cappuchino on my HP DV6 laptop.. In a total panic moment shut it down, removed the battery and grabbed paper towels to *try* and clean it. After the coffee stopped oozing out of the USB, ethernet and VGA ports I pulled out the harddrive, which to my great relief survived. Brought the laptop to a cleaning company (for laptops that it :D) and they cleaned the motherboard. AMAZINGLY it survived!! The only thing that hasen't is those touch sensitive sound controls.. But hey, after a LARGE cup of coffee, not too bad :D

 

+1; Happened to me also. After having dropped a full cup of coffee on my laptop, I took the AC cord away, removed battery asap and reversed the laptop upside down. Then a colleague offered me to go to his home, which was 1 km away and as soon as we were there, I managed to dismantle the keyboard and we 'hairdryed' the motherboard...

 

Astonishingly, the laptop survived but 3 keys of my keyboard were dead. I had to replace it. And damn, I didn't imagine that spare parts for a laptop were that expensive!

 

Conclusion: +1 to rule of safety saying 'no liquid around electrics or electronics'

 

EDIT: the story was in 2005; the laptop is still functional!

[Yurgon]

Fortunately, my Warthog (and previously the Cougar) never drank much of anything. But I can't remember how many keyboards have fallen prey to some kind of liquid (a glass of water, that is) or other (beer). I've gotten used to buying 2 or 3 at a time because mishaps tend to happen Sunday nights, with no electronics stores still open.

 

BTW, can anyone recommend a good, durable keyboard that'll survive the casual glass of water or bottle of beer? So far I'm sticking with cheap Logitechs, and they're the opposite of survivable. :cry:

[Vekkinho]

That's why I drink fast...

 

Few years ago I placed a beer on top of a guitar amp head, few moments later I couldn't hear my self play anymore so I turned around to see WTF... beer that cost me somethin like US$1,000...

[Cedaway]

Fortunately, my Warthog (and previously the Cougar) never drank much of anything. But I can't remember how many keyboards have fallen prey to some kind of liquid (a glass of water, that is) or other (beer). I've gotten used to buying 2 or 3 at a time because mishaps tend to happen Sunday nights, with no electronics stores still open.

 

BTW, can anyone recommend a good, durable keyboard that'll survive the casual glass of water or bottle of beer? So far I'm sticking with cheap Logitechs, and they're the opposite of survivable. :cry:

 

http://www.logitech.com/us-us/product/washable-keyboard-K310

 

 

[Yurgon]

http://www.logitech.com/us-us/product/washable-keyboard-K310

 

That looks very promising, thanks!

[Whisky One]

my cat likes to be in my pit. I had a night off and opened a big can of beer and my cat tipped it over after I took about 2 sips. All the beer doing it's liquid dance right next to my warthog throttles! In a nice act of panic I unplugged it and recovered it from my side panel. it's still good :)

[Hobo]

BTW, can anyone recommend a good, durable keyboard that'll survive the casual glass of water or bottle of beer? So far I'm sticking with cheap Logitechs, and they're the opposite of survivable. :cry:

 

The one posted by Cedaway is a good choice, there's a bunch of others like..

 

http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_noss_1?url=search-alias%3Daps&field-keywords=waterproof+keyboard

 

 

I have a few keyboards that have found a pepsi in it after the cat decided to go panic attack and run across the desk. The worst being my G15 keyboard. Nothing like a little tlc of popping off each of the keys and cleaning it out with cuetips and rubbing alcohol. Fortunately everything electronic of mine that has met a liquid, to include a cellphone in the toilet, has always worked without any loss of it's use.

Edited December 28, 2012 by Hobo

[Cali]

Fortunately, my Warthog (and previously the Cougar) never drank much of anything. But I can't remember how many keyboards have fallen prey to some kind of liquid (a glass of water, that is) or other (beer). I've gotten used to buying 2 or 3 at a time because mishaps tend to happen Sunday nights, with no electronics stores still open.

 

BTW, can anyone recommend a good, durable keyboard that'll survive the casual glass of water or bottle of beer? So far I'm sticking with cheap Logitechs, and they're the opposite of survivable. :cry:

 

Why don't you just keep drinks away from your stuff, that seems like it would be much easier. After the 1st or 2nd kb, you would think you would have learned.

[EtherealN]

Actually, many keyboards (not ones with Cherry MX switches!) can be washed. You just want to make sure you don't plug them in until you are extremely certain that you have gotten them dry - a day or three to dry and almost any standard rubber dome KB should be fine as long as you didn't wash it in _boiling_ water. Detergent can also be a bad idea.

[Yurgon]

The one posted by Cedaway is a good choice, there's a bunch of others like..

 

http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_noss_1?url=search-alias%3Daps&field-keywords=waterproof+keyboard

 

Thanks, I may try one of them. If I do, I'll let you guys know how well it works.

 

Why don't you just keep drinks away from your stuff, that seems like it would be much easier. After the 1st or 2nd kb, you would think you would have learned.

 

Yeah, but that would imply that I was aware of stuff like action and re-action. :music_whistling:

 

So long as it's just keyboards, I don't care too much. The ones I was talking about look and feel like disposable stuff anyways. And mishaps tend to happen. Doesn't mean I have to keep my beverages out of reach. :music_whistling:

 

Actually, many keyboards (not ones with Cherry MX switches!) can be washed. You just want to make sure you don't plug them in until you are extremely certain that you have gotten them dry - a day or three to dry and almost any standard rubber dome KB should be fine as long as you didn't wash it in _boiling_ water. Detergent can also be a bad idea.

 

Yeah, I've gotten pretty good at disassembling, washing, cleaning and then reassembling Logitech keyboards (especially on weekends, when it's a tad difficult to get hands on a replacement without breaking any laws :D).

 

Problem is, as far as I can tell they are very vulnerable to what I think is corrosion. No matter how carefully I treated the keyboards after beverage carnage, some keys (that have one circuit path in common) cease to work while most others are okay. The common denominator for all the non-working keys is that one or more of the circuit paths connecting them look discolored/stained in one or several spots. No clue whether these could be rescued, but by cleaning them with (non-boiling :)) water and a cleaning-cloth, I couldn't get them to work again (including, of course, ample time to dry in the sun or on the heating).

 

I'd like to add that I was mildly exaggerating; it's not like I burn through keyboards on a monthly basis. But I really did kill a few during the past couple of years, so I'd love to get a keyboard that suits my needs and can take a certain amount of beating, especially when it comes to spilling water or beer. My question was not so much aimed at "How could I avoid the problems" and more at "If, at a reasonable price, I can get a keyboard that'll endure this kind of punishing, it'll pay off in the long run". :)

[BIGNEWY]

Just finished clearing up. . . .

 

Got up to answer the door

 

dog decided it would be fun to jump up and fetch my tv controller ( he knows how much it annoys me )

 

Got back from the front door to find my can of cider ( strongbow ) had been tipped all over my warthog stick !!

[diveplane]

Just finished clearing up. . . .

 

Got up to answer the door

 

dog decided it would be fun to jump up and fetch my tv controller ( he knows how much it annoys me )

 

Got back from the front door to find my can of cider ( strongbow ) had been tipped all over my warthog stick !!

 

ouch

[Cali]

You guys never learn.