What happens to a CF card. . .

[christopher_platt]

...if you have it in your pocket and jump in the pool? I have a 128 meg promaster card that I bought at the same time as my camera. Well, I finally had enough to buy a Sandisk 512 extreme (very fast w/ my D70 on RAW - love it) and it came with a handy-dandy little carrying wallet (keychain type thing). So I stuck my old card in it and put it on my wife's car keys and stuck them in my pocket. Went swimming, realized it later. Does anyone out there know how CF cards actually work? Is it dead forever, or is it one of those things that'll work again when it dries out? Will it fry my card reader when I check it?
Any help would be appreciated,
Chip

[Peter_AUS]

Won't effect it, just make sure you let it dry out, and blow the water off of it, and the pins. I have read many times where someone has done similar things, and also through washing machines as well. They don't have any moving parts like microdrives which are very small hard drives.

Just make sure it is fully dried out. You can shake all the water out of it, there wouldn't be much at all. The thing I would be concerned about is in the future if there is any residual water rusting, but you should be save, I think the insides of them are soldered anyway and the rest of the leads etc are gold (I might be wrong on that point though).

[Sebastian]

Only thing I'd be careful with would be the chlorine. I would rinse the card out with distilled water thouroughly and then let it dry for two days, THEN put it in the card reader.

[Michael Fanelli]

Only thing I'd be careful with would be the chlorine. I would rinse the card out with distilled water thouroughly and then let it dry for two days, THEN put it in the card reader.

One of my cameras fell three times into a muddy and polluted river. I took the CF card out, wiped the mud off, rinsed it in distilled water, and left it on the counter to dry. The next day, the card was fine and all the photos were intact. Too bad the camera didn't survive that well.

[Cowgirl]

Several months ago, I accidently washed mine in the clothes washing machine - with Tide soap and fabric softener. The photos were still there - I was amazed. It's still working fine, & I keep it as my backup card. Sandisk 512mb.


Kathy