Why do my AirPods Max always die in winter?

[Wingnuts]

Hi all,
I have had AirPods Max for the last 5 years now. I wear them all of the time and have had them replaced every year in winter.
I reside in New Zealand and we have high humidity levels all-year round. We have fairly good consumer law so units are replaced/repaired without warranty. I often opt for complete replacement as I find the "repair" only lasts a few days.

Apple Support is very fragmented here so everything tends to take a few weeks. I now find myself just buying a retail pair from apple.com and returning it when my "replacement" arrives.

My latest set has just died and I was wondering what could be causing them to fail? It must be something to do with the cold/humidity - but I'm not sure what... I'd like to fix whatever I can as I am wasting an enormous amount of resources (Apple's money/time/fuel) shipping these units around the world (replacements come from overseas as we do not have local web-store stock).

Replacement/Repair Cases:
July 2022 (winter - terrible noise from this one)
August 2022 (winter)
October 2022 (spring)
June 2024 (winter)
May 2025 (winter)
April 2026 (autumn, but it's been very cold)

 

[Conutz]

I seem to remember something about condensation…

 

[Wingnuts]

I seem to remember something about condensation…

Yes I believe it's the condensation issue. I haven't found anybody else who has narrowed down their replacement timeframe to seasons/temperature differences. I assume North American customers are limited to the 1yr warranty/AppleCare plans (if any) for repair options...

New Zealand has high humidity and mild winters. We don't heat our homes as much compared to the Northern Hemisphere either. I can only think that a product redesign would cost more than the number of repair/replacement cases that Apple have to deal with. I guess a product redesign would require removal of the aluminium housing?

I wonder if people from similar climates has experienced the same issues?