this post was submitted on 08 May 2025
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Right to Repair
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Whether it be electronics, automobiles or medical equipment, the manufacturers should not be able to horde “oem” parts, render your stuff useless if you repair it with aftermarket parts, or hide schematics of their products.
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I've had a Philips Sonicare brush for ten years at this point. Do they just not make them well anymore, or did I just luck out? I only need to charge it like once very month or two.
I bought one recently and this still seems to be the case.
How often do you brush?
I guess ours last about 7 or 8 years before they start noticeably degrading. I certainly have to charge at least once a month, though.
Years and years ago, we started with Sonicare, and when that died I got an Oral-B. It was categorically worse, and my dentist even noticed. So I went back to Sonicare. My wife never switched.
Sonicare's QC is very poor. My wife's been lucky, but I went through two Airflosses in as many years before I stopped getting them; the first died within the warranty and I got an exchange; the second, just after the warrantee expired.
My current Sonicare is about 5 years old, and the battery is holding up, but about a year after I got it it developed a loose part in the head and it is super noisy; like, you can tell I'm using it from across the house. My wife's is the same age and is almost silent, so I think it's just a QC issue.
However, to stay in topic: the batteries in these are also not-self-serviceable. Is there an electric toothbrush whose battery is?
It's a loose loctited (red) screw that holds the brush head handle in place, bunch of videos on YouTube how to fix it. Bit of a PITA to get it open - but I cleaned, tightened and loctited again the crap out of it and going another 3 years strong since that fix.
That is fantastic, thank you! It's not so bad I considered replacing it - almost nothing short of complete failure or battery death will prompt me to buy a new one - but it'd be awesome to fix the noise issue.
I didn't even think about looking for a fix. IME, they're basically glued together, and I didn't consider they'd have any accessible screws.
1-2/day, using the default 2-minute routine. I do not leave it on the charger after using it. I only charge when it does the little vibrate pattern indicating a need to.
Yeah, me too. You got lucky, or I've been unlucky!
I have an oral b IO9 that I just replaced the battery with a new 14500
Did you have to crack it, or is it user serviceable?
It’s in a weird spot where if you’d ask Oral B they’d probably say it’s not replaceable. But in practice it’s as simple as the old electric brushes that took AA batteries to change.
https://www.ifixit.com/Guide/Oral-B+iO+Battery+Replacement/136696