Black gunk inside Oral-B electric toothbrush head?

[MineMineMineMama]

Hi I am wondering if anyone else has experienced black gunk coming from inside the body of their electric toothbrush?
I have just had an awful experience with Kenny from the Oral-B customer service team who dismissed my concerns, refused to escalate my complaint and also refused to send me copies of our recorded telephone conversation as well 😣

My daughter’s toothbrush had black gunk coming out of the head, so I replaced it. Only for it to happen again within weeks. So I flushed the new head out (see pics) and was horrified by the amount of chunks of black that came out. Again 11 days later, the same thing again so I photographed again. I stopped my daughter using it and investigated, spoke to Kenny at Oral-B sent him pics and videos… He has said that this is normal and not a fault but a build up of toothpaste (even though every week when I clean our bathroom I clean all our toothbrushes). My son’s toothbrush which is exactly the same model and was purchased at the same time is fine.

Feeling utterly fobbed off and concerned that Oral-B would dismiss this as normal. It’s gross to think that this is what is lurking inside some toothbrushes which children are potentially swallowing.

If you read the instructions that came with your brush, you'll see that they tell you to take the head off the body each day.

Your daughter presumably somehow gets more toothpaste up inside the head. Start cleaning it daily.
I don’t think this would be oral b’s fault.

Er yeh you need to change these every now and then! Not oral bs fault. It's yours.

When I've finished brushing, I remove the head, and rinse both the head and top of the toothbrush under water and dry them off.

I expect that's mould from build up of toothpaste, saliva and food debris 🤢

So you guys all think that’s normal for a brand new toothbrush head after 11 days?

Did you not bother to read the instructions with your brushes then?

That is a brand new head after 11 days!

... and the instructions say to remove/wash the head after each use. Not to wait 11 days.

Umm. Yes. The head isn’t producing the gunk by itself. It is how your daughter is using and cleaning it.

Swap.the two toothbrush bodies between daughter and son and see if the problems is caused by the toothbrush body or by the user.

our oralb toothbrush stopped working after 9 months and no one would help with that either

This kept happening with my son's toothbrush. I eventually gave up and switched him back to a manual toothbrush.
It's definitely a user error. It's mould, which will grow if you don't clean the head properly.

The head needs to be removed, rinsed and left off the body of the toothbrush after every use, otherwise mould builds up.
That’s quite a lot for 11 days so I think someone is using an excessive amount of toothpaste but it is what happens if you don’t follow the instructions

Yes, that's mould. The head needs to be removed after every use, rinsed and allowed to dry. If you leave it on, then it stays wet and in a warm bathroom will grow mould quickly. Not the fault of the toothbrush.

I suspect it's user error if your son's is fine and it's happening repeatedly to your daughters. I presume you are buying the heads from the same place and using the same toothpaste for both children so it must be something to do with how she uses it.
I take my head off after each use, give it a quick shake and dry off both the head and handle, no black gunk.

I dry my head and handle after each use and store them separately. No issues with gunk.

If I forget to take the head off for a couple of days mine gets really gunky too

I pop mine in with a retainer steriliser tablet once a week

Mine can get like that to. I separate the head and body daily, rinse them well and leave them to drain on kitchen roll inside the bathroom cupboard. Still get some mould though.

I'll be buying a different brand when this one breaks.

That's normal if you don't rinse the toothbrush head well after brushing and leave it to dry.

After use it's covered in a film of toothpaste, saliva and bacterial plaque - yuck. Rinsing will remove most (although not 100%) of this. The head is hollow inside and when it's attached to the brush, it's not easy for the inside to dry out, so it will grow mould, because that's what happens in a moist environment.

Happening after 11 days is a bit grim but possibly being a child she isn't really rinsing well enough if at all. And perhaps the air circulation in your bathroom is not that great - we used to massively struggle with mould growth in one flat which didn't have an outside window. There was an extractor fan but it wasn't maintained well and I think not powerful enough for a room with a shower/bath - I think it was designed more for a downstairs loo. We now have a bigger bathroom with a large window but if someone only cracks the window open rather than opening it fully, we get mould starting to appear within a couple of days.

You can tell if your air circulation isn't good if your bathroom mirror and window steam up after a shower or bath and they don't clear quickly.

That's mould. You need to take the toothbrush apart daily or at least frequently and give it a good cleaning.

This happened to my sons after 2 days with a new toothbrush head he got black stuff. We realised the fault was with the actual brush not being sealed correctly and the black was coming from inside.It’s not mould but carbon from the motor. Needless to say it was thrown away. It was not user error, do not feel like a bad parent sometimes there is a fault.

I also wondered if it's something coming out of the motor - carbon or grease. If you clean it, then run it for a little while without the head on you might be able to see if it's coming out from where the metal shaft goes into the body of the toothbrush.

At the risk of inducing a bit of pearl clutching.....We hardly ever remove our toothbrush heads unless we change them to new brushes, in this house.

No black mould here folks.

It doesn't look like mould to me, as pp suggests I think it's coming from the motor.