If you have a Tineco S3 (or possibly any Tineco hard floor cleaner like the S3) and you’re reading this article, you probably have one of the three common faults and are sick of babying it.

The three common faults I’m talking about are:

• When you put it on to charge, it only charges for a few seconds then stops [battery fault]
• Or worse, it doesn’t charge at all in the first place [charge dock fault]
• When you turn it on, it runs the mop and releases water, but doesn’t suck it up [motor is rusted]

In my case, I bought a faulty S3 which had all three of them. I’m quite cheap, but also handy, so I like buying expensive things that are broken and fixing them. And these aren’t cheap devices, but are quite cheaply made and poorly designed. I described it once as “a bunch of software guys got together and decided hardware can’t be that hard” so you got an expensive but awesome device that worked great in a showroom for 5 minutes, but is plagued with even short term hardware faults from wear and tear that an experienced manufacturer would have thought about in the design process.

Since I’ve already fixed mine, I don’t have photos right now of the fixes, but will describe them and take photos some other time when I have time.

Are Tineco devices worth buying?

If you ended up here whilst looking for reviews for a purchasing decision. Don’t do it. They’re overpriced and don’t last long.

If they’re still operating in 10 years, they’ll probably be excellent devices and this recommendation will change, but I expect they’ll be fighting A LOT of warranty complaints and returns, to the point where I have doubts they’ll survive long.

If you’re thinking about buying a used one, only do so if it’s an exceptional deal, and you’re willing to fix them WHEN they break. They really are good when they work, they just often stop working.

Fault One: It charges for only a few seconds when put on the dock

This one is very common, and online solutions are “put it on and take it off regularly, possibly rock it on the dock, and at some point it will hit a point and charge normally”.

This can only be fixed with a new battery. You’ll probably also find that if you do get it charged to 100%, you’ll be able to use it normally and battery life drops slowly, then it hits a point and plummets.

The real problem is a design fault where the battery charging is controlled by the computer, so if any parameters are out of the ordinary, the computer won’t let it charge. Phones are often like this as well.

Most battery powered devices and appliances have what’s called a Battery Management System (BMS) attached to the battery, then the charge adapter has a direct line to the BMS, this means that as long as the BMS is happy (which exists to maintain battery health and prevent overcharging and fires) the batteries will charge. Then the computer has its own line to the battery for draw.

By putting a computer in the middle, they had to programme it to control the charge, and for whatever reason it doesn’t like when the battery has degraded and won’t charge when the voltage is below a certain value.

To fix this, you need a new battery, which can be purchase from AliExpress (I actually bought an aftermarket one with twice the normal capacity for around $70NZD, took a very long time to arrive, though). After replacing the battery, this problem went away.

Annoyingly, the battery is locked away in the main body of the S3, so you need to take all the screns out the back, and one screw out from the centre behind the water canister and the back pulls away.

Then take out the screws holding in the white frame that remains and underneath that is the battery, which is connected by tool-less spade plugs. Then reverse the process.

I’d give it a 3/5 for difficulty, where 5/5 is press a button and click in a replacement, and 1/5 is it’s all glued together and impossible to fix.

Fault Two: It doesn’t charge at all when connected to the dock, the device doesn’t even recognise it.

This could be a few things, but the main one is “the connection isn’t very good” between the dock and the device.

The way it works is the DC adapter plugs into the main body, which houses a little box. Inside that little box is two spring-loaded pins hooked to the DC terminals, the pins are not attached to the spring except by contact. It’s another poor design.

First things first, simply clean where the pins touch the device and hope for the best.

Assuming that doesn’t work, remove all the screws on the dock, and pop out the little box. There’s no fine electronics in here, so you don’t need to be too delicate.

Once you have it out, use a thin metal wedge, like a flathead screwdriver to pry the bottom off the little box.

You’ll then see the spring-loaded connections, and the pins. There’s very likely dirt or corrosion between the springs and the pins. Pull them all out and give them a good clean and (after reassembling) almost certainly solve your issue. For a permanent fix, just solder the pins to the springs.

Reassemble and test.

Fault Three: The mop turns and release water, but the vacuum doesn’t start

When you turn it on, the mop runs for a few seconds and releases water, but the vacuum never starts. It then switches itself off. This also happens if you run a clean cycle.

The way the machine is designed, is that you’ve got a normal vacuum cleaner fan, behind a moisture filter, and a diverter. The fan runs and creates suction, water travels up and hits the diverter and travels down. This isn’t perfect, and water still gets into the fan (when it shouldn’t). If the device then sits for a long time, the fan rusts and seizes.

Take the waste water canister off, and if you look above it you’ll see some vents, this is the fan. Load it up with a dispersant or contact cleaner like WD40 (or many products literally called “contact cleaner”), spray it in pretty liberally, it won’t damage the electrics (but the rust in the fan might, but hell, it doesn’t work as it is, if the fan does eventually fail, you can buy replacements on AliExpress). Then just take a thin, strong rod (like a wooden chopstick) and shove it in and force the fan to turn.

Done, the fan was seized, if it turns, it’s not now seized. You’ll probably find it works fine now if you turn it on and it’ll grind out any of the material that caused it to seize in the first place.

Conclusion

High chance one or more of these problems affects your device if you’re reading this, and these fixes will likely sort it out.

If you’re reading this as a review with intent to buy, I wouldn’t recommend it, unless it’s excessively cheap (less than $100NZD, or ~60USD) and you’re prepared to fix it.

Admittedly, none of these breaks are permanent and impossible to fix, and when it works, it works great. But the design flaws prevent you entirely using the device when it is broken.

I’ll add photos some other time, or if someone reads this and requests them (and I had forgotten).