Mere days after the wildly successful iPhone 6 Plus launch, enraged buyers have taken to the Internet to demonstrate an undesired attribute: the phone's pliancy. Owners began noticing an unhealthy gradient developing after having kept the phone in their pocket for a time. Though smartphones bending is nothing new, Apple's premium pricing and reputation make this news likelier to form a setback for the company. A YouTube video examining the iPhone 6 Plus's structural quality has already racked up millions of views.
[Editor's Note: The follow-up video mentions when trying to bend the iPhone 6 Plus back to shape, the screen cracked. The Samsung Galaxy Note 3 does not appear to have the same problems.]
This discussion has been archived.
No new comments can be posted.
iPhone 6 Plus Exhibits Bending Issues
|
Log In/Create an Account
| Top
| 54 comments
| Search Discussion
The Fine Print: The following comments are owned by whoever posted them. We are not responsible for them in any way.
(Score: 3, Funny) by dyingtolive on Wednesday September 24 2014, @08:41PM
Maybe they just wanted something to compete with the LG Flex.
You're holding it wrong!
Don't blame me, I voted for moose wang!
(Score: 2) by lhsi on Wednesday September 24 2014, @08:44PM
Really? I've never had a phone bend or heard of anyone's phone bending. How common is this supposed to be?
(Score: 2) by Alfred on Wednesday September 24 2014, @08:49PM
(Score: 2) by VLM on Wednesday September 24 2014, @08:52PM
Read up on the "open your case and replace the battery" type stories, they all revolve around wiggling the case a bit while unsnapping clips.
You may only be bending the case a couple hundredths of an inch, but it adds up to help unsnap the case.
(Score: 2) by tibman on Wednesday September 24 2014, @09:04PM
I've never heard of it either. Watching that guy bend phones was making me cringe. Poor phones!
SN won't survive on lurkers alone. Write comments.
(Score: 2) by frojack on Wednesday September 24 2014, @09:20PM
Never seen any phone bend, nor to I know anyone else who did either.
That said, I avoid sitting on my phones or subjecting them to that much bending force.
This is a problem of excessive thinness combined with a relatively soft metal. And the weakness of the frame at the cutout for buttons played no small part. Easily fixed if the manufacturers (all of them, not just Apple) would stop this crazy rush to ridiculous thinness at the expense of battery life.
No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by Nerdfest on Wednesday September 24 2014, @09:30PM
Absolutely agreed. They could also eliminate the need for cases by adding some better structure around the edge. I'd rather have a phone 12mm this or so that would last under very heavy use all day. I'm actually surprised one of the Android manufacturers hasn't made one (or maybe they have?).
(Score: 2) by bryan on Wednesday September 24 2014, @11:25PM
Maybe with that extra mm or two they could properly inset the camera lens, so that the phone doesn't wobble when placed flat on a desk.
(Score: 2) by Nerdfest on Wednesday September 24 2014, @11:35PM
Of relax, they totally photoshopped that out in the ads and press releases. It obviously doesn't actually exist.
(Score: 2) by mojo chan on Thursday September 25 2014, @08:08AM
Various manufacturers offer rugged phones. You have sport models that are similar to normal phones, and real rugged ones that are a lot bulkier. The Galaxy Active line, for example.
const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
(Score: 1) by Gertlex on Thursday September 25 2014, @02:14AM
My iPod Touch 2nd gen evidently flexed in my pocket and has a cracked screen (and worked fine for another 4.5 years of active use). Happened while carrying a flip phone, and sitting playing Mafia with friends... It got bent around the (not-flat) cellphone by the fabric of my pants. You could tell where it deformed, because the metal backing on the side with the volume control bowed out on the front side, and correspondingly that's where the crack started at. Some of the subsequent iDevice models moved to having two separate circular volume buttons, presumably to reduce this structural weakness.
(Score: 2) by SlimmPickens on Wednesday September 24 2014, @08:44PM
at least one 4chan user was convinced to use a common kitchen appliance to perform wave charging [google.com]
(Score: 3, Interesting) by VLM on Wednesday September 24 2014, @08:45PM
Is there any practical reason to want a thin phone other than the usual fad like car tailfins and spoilers?
For obvious engineering reasons it would be a lot less floppy if it was twice as thick.
For example try
http://easycalculation.com/engineering/mechanical/deflection-hollow-rectangular-beams.php [easycalculation.com]
Aluminum 6 inches long 3 wide 0.1 thick/height wall thickness 0.05 10 pounds force get a bend of a quarter inch (obviously the glass would shatter)
Ditto with 0.2 thick and you get 38 thousands of an inch. I have machinist dial indicators used in centering things in machine tools that could easily measure a bend of 38 thou in something 6 inches long, but your average goof won't see it.
The actual numbers don't matter as much as a demonstration of the scaling, where doubling the thickness of the phone takes it from quarter inch to you're going to need precision machinist tools to measure it.
(Score: 2) by Lagg on Wednesday September 24 2014, @08:51PM
Not really, my nexus one isn't paper thin but it's still about as thin as an empty wallet. After that reducing thinness just starts to become pointless at best. I like your spoiler comparison since it's pretty apt. Spoilers actually hurt gas mileage and are pointless below a certain speed which most of these silly cars will never reach.
http://lagg.me [lagg.me] 🗿
(Score: 2) by frojack on Wednesday September 24 2014, @09:37PM
Ah, fond memories of my Nexus One... Too bad it sufferd pre-mature button fail and forced obsolescence. Still on my desk still works, but it takes special procedures to restart it if it ever exhausts its battery. Still use it as my backup device for my password vault.
Its exactly as thick as my ancient iPhone 3G, also still cluttering my desk. It was a perfect thickness, and I've seen no benefit of my later phones being thinner (which they are). None.
No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.
(Score: 2) by Nerdfest on Wednesday September 24 2014, @11:13PM
I always wanted one, they looked like a really nice phone. I have a couple of original Galaxy phones around that are still usable.
(Score: 2) by Lagg on Wednesday September 24 2014, @11:19PM
They are. Got mine when Google was still selling them with the custom stamps on the back and have no desire to get another one yet. Definitely worth getting if you can find one. Only issue is newer android versions. I'm running cyanogenmod and they haven't released a new one for the group of phones that the N1 is part of for some time now so keep that in mind.
http://lagg.me [lagg.me] 🗿
(Score: 1) by danmars on Thursday September 25 2014, @02:55PM
I'm still using a Nexus One as my primary phone. I always keep it in my pocket. It has some minor scratches and the camera lens protector came off, but all the buttons still work, and nothing's cracked or bent. As far as the shape, I never find myself wishing for a thinner phone. Larger, maybe. But not thinner.
(Score: 2) by frojack on Thursday September 25 2014, @06:37PM
For me, the tiny memory drove me away.
I simply couldn't run even a minimal set of applications in available memory until I rooted and trashed a bunch of stuff.
No, you are mistaken. I've always had this sig.
(Score: 2) by richtopia on Wednesday September 24 2014, @09:34PM
I find that 15-20mm is the threshold thickness for a comfortable pocket. That should include my wallet. Unfortunately my current phone is 12mm, so that must reside in the opposite pocket.
(Score: 2) by VLM on Wednesday September 24 2014, @09:58PM
"15-20mm is the threshold thickness for a comfortable pocket. That should include my wallet."
(Runs conversion in my head, pulls out wallet...) Dude, you probably deserve more pay.
If you figure a mm per "card" just a drivers license, FCC license, a couple credit cards (mine, and "shared"), med insurance, dental insurance, an ATM card, some "top sekret" one time password cards, employer ID, all that added together at a mm each plus a reasonable thickness leather wallet means you're already at negative margin to carry some walking cash and a phone.
I especially find this confusing with all the "social media marketing" for women and smartphones. My wife claims her purse is stylish, and my keen engineers eyes think its big enough to carry a cluster of rasp pi I don't think the phone thickness matters for marketing pinterest to the ladies. (is pinterest still a thing or is it already last years news?)
I also tend to do the phone in one pocket and the wallet in another because I don't want to drop one on the ground when attempting to manipulate the other. Even if they were both as thin as a credit card I'd put one in each pocket.
Another anecdote is my "fitness oriented" fitbit is about 2/3 inch thick maybe in its silicone clippy thing? And it fits at the bottom of my pants pocket, even when I wash my pants in the clothes washer, which is a whole nother thing.
(Score: 2) by TrumpetPower! on Wednesday September 24 2014, @11:23PM
Ditch the wallet.
I carry around a reasonable selection of cards and a typical amount of cash. The cash I wrap around the cards, and I hold the whole thing together with one of those black paperclips with the fold-in levers. The clip measures about 7 mm at the back end, and is generally not quite at its maximum expansion without bending at more than 90° (depending on how much cash I'm carrying).
Several years ago I lost a wallet or had it stolen or whatever and, as an emergency measure until I could buy a new wallet, went instead with a money clip somebody had on hand. That worked great for long enough that I never did get around to buying another wallet, but the stuff I was carrying was a bit wider than ideal for the clip, and the metal eventually started to fatigue. A couple years ago, I replaced the wearing-out money clip with a simple black paperclip, and haven't looked back. Wouldn't use anything else for the world.
Cheers,
b&
All but God can prove this sentence true.
(Score: 2) by Silentknyght on Thursday September 25 2014, @01:42AM
I'm guessing you're talking about what is commonly referred to as a "binder clip."
Do you carry your wallet in your front pocket? I can imagine that sitting on a binder clip would be uncomfortable.
(Score: 2) by TrumpetPower! on Thursday September 25 2014, @03:29PM
Yes -- that's it.
In the days when I still carried a wallet, I moved it from the back pocket to the front after having some minor lower back and leg pain.
This is, I think, the smallest size such clip as is made. The spine is 1/4" thick and 3/4" long. The clip doesn't appreciably add to the bulk of the cards and cash. The whole thing is slightly thinner than my iPhone 5S and slightly smaller than the display (and therefore much smaller than the whole phone).
Cheers,
b&
All but God can prove this sentence true.
(Score: 2) by Daiv on Thursday September 25 2014, @04:36PM
I absolutely agree.
Started carrying a money clip in high school, when my work would still let us cash our checks on site every Friday. By college, ditched a wallet and started carrying drivers license and up to four other cards as well, all in my front pocket.
I highly suggest giving the binder clip a try like TrumpetPower! has explained. Throw anything else you may think you need in your glove box or just do without.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday September 25 2014, @05:16AM
You can contact Ted Walther at http://www.rootsoffaith.net/profile/TedWalther [rootsoffaith.net]
Maybe he'd be interested in working on a debian fork?
I'm trying to register to the site but 12 hrs later no dice.
(Score: 2) by richtopia on Thursday September 25 2014, @03:55PM
My wallet is about 10mm. I make due without cards.
Wallet is nylon: http://www.amazon.com/ALL-ETT-910201-Nylon-Sport-Wallet/dp/B00GR6ASBW/ref=sr_1_5?ie=UTF8&qid=1411660255&sr=8-5&keywords=nylon+wallet [amazon.com]
Then one credit card, atm card, drivers license, and one health insurance card (4 total). And a couple dollars, favoring big bills.
I have a whole other lecture on complaining about car keys and how large they are. Even without the fob, they are massive these days.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday September 24 2014, @09:51PM
deflection is a function of length cubed, so increase the length of the phone by a small amount compounds deflection
deflection for a rectangular beam section (such as a phone bezel) is inversely proportional to the thickness cubed, so adding a small amount of thickness improves resistance to bending significantly
http://www.advancepipeliner.com/Resources/Others/Beams/Beam_Deflection_Formulae.pdf [advancepipeliner.com]
(Score: 2) by meisterister on Wednesday September 24 2014, @10:07PM
The only thing that I can think of is that by flattening out a phone, the engineers involved could have a way of more easily dissipating heat generated by the phone's CPU. They're probably optimizing for surface area and closeness of the CPU to the outer edge of the device (ie. less poorly heat-conducting battery to go through). There's also the side benefit that all of the consumers/tech journalists who are on the wrong end of the bell curve will wet themselves with excitement over having a phone so thin that they can cut themselves on it.
(May or may not have been) Posted from my K6-2, Athlon XP, or Pentium I/II/III.
(Score: 2) by sjames on Thursday September 25 2014, @12:40AM
Kindly explain how I'm supposed to chop onions with a thick slab!
(Score: 2) by Alfred on Wednesday September 24 2014, @08:46PM
First: I don't own one because the price tag is ridiculous.
Second: I liked apple before it was cool, not so much anymore. Hackintosh FTW.
Third: WTF Apple? Did you guys start serving how-to-suck-meatloaf in the cafeteria?!? Spend millions, or maybe billions, on a new design and no one, not even Ive who gets to touch it, stresses it as much as a front pocket? What, do you treat prototypes as egg shells? Destructive testing is the norm. That camera sticking out shows you are planning on people getting cases but the cases aren't reinforced titanium! You know the phone must have it's own structural integrity and fail. CNC machining does not create unobtainuim (original meaning, not avatar meaning). We expect better from plastic phones.
*FACEPALM*
Antenna gate I can understand, the metal was covered by a rubbery disguise, but this is an epic fail for any Mechanical Engineering grad. Go test it in a microwave or something.
(Score: 2) by dyingtolive on Wednesday September 24 2014, @08:56PM
You won't be buying titanium cases. They'll be selling itanium cases. At least, that's what Dvorak thinks.
Don't blame me, I voted for moose wang!
(Score: 2) by Nerdfest on Wednesday September 24 2014, @11:19PM
I think it's going to make wearing belt-pouches fashionable again *crosses fingers*.
(Score: 4, Interesting) by Silentknyght on Thursday September 25 2014, @01:48AM
I'm sure this came up internally, and was dismissed because (a) most people were expected to get cases to make this a non-issue, and besides (b) they were already too far along in the process when the design flaw turned up to change it. They're not stupid; they're just hoping to mitigate financial losses. I'm virtually certain they identified that the flaw was due to the need to have physical volume buttons (and therefore, the cutouts which weakened the structure), and that there was no easy fix. Re-engineering the entire product at that stage would likely have cost umpteen millions, if it was even do-able. I'm sure the actuaries did the calculation, and the financial hit for this fiasco was less than redoing the whole thing.
(Score: 2) by quacking duck on Thursday September 25 2014, @04:11AM
At least the iPhone isn't the first smartphone with bending issues (insert joke about Apple catching up to Android makers yet again).
IMHO Apple *was* stupid for going taller/wider while making it less thick. Given their track record, it was almost guaranteed they'd go for thinning it again regardless of screen size. I knew there'd be a pocket-bending PR fiasco, even if overblown, the moment I learned the dimensions. And I don't even have a materials or structures background.
They should have tested this months, if not almost a year ago if they'd already set dimensions to aim for, using a bunch of trial mockups using the same materials. I'm pretty sure they knew exactly what the risk of bending was, decided to weight it against the cost of replacing them, and to heck with the negative PR when reports of bent iPhones hit the news because people will buy them anyway.
(Score: 2) by strattitarius on Wednesday September 24 2014, @09:14PM
Tech Armor Flex Protect Case on AMZN [amzn.com] (no referral or anything)
Slashdot Beta Sucks. Soylent Alpha Rules. News at 11.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday September 24 2014, @09:32PM
It won't sync with most cars' Bluetooth. More innovation from Apple.
(Score: 2) by Freeman on Thursday September 25 2014, @05:30PM
Don't worry all you need is $50k and you can have your very own iCar.
Joshua 1:9 "Be strong and of a good courage; be not afraid, neither be thou dismayed: for the Lord thy God is with thee"
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday September 24 2014, @09:39PM
If we're following the SoylentNews narrative, this is the first time the iPhone 6 has even been mentioned. SoylentNews didn't cover the iPhone 6 announcement, but here is some bullshit bending story.
Hell, there was an actual problem with an iOS 8 update today -- not just some bending beat-up, but an actual tech-related problem -- and that hasn't been covered either.
(Score: 5, Funny) by bob_super on Wednesday September 24 2014, @09:49PM
$juggernaut releases yearly update of $product. Main new feature is copying the screen size proven popular by $main_competitor, in line with $juggernaut's screen growth trend in that regards.
I'm missing the need for the media to go bonkers about this.
$juggernaut releases $product, breaking sales record - News only if the record gets broken by at least a thousand base points.
$juggernaut's new record-setting and luxury-positioned $product has apparent flaw which puts durability in question - News
(Score: 2, Informative) by SrLnclt on Wednesday September 24 2014, @09:57PM
Sounds like you already knew about Apple's latest news, as do most of us here. If you wanted to actually talk about it here when it is still fresh, you could always sign-in/sign-up and submit your story [soylentnews.org].
(Score: 3, Informative) by n1 on Wednesday September 24 2014, @10:16PM
Anyone can submit stories, creating an account is not required at all to contribute. Nothing wrong with being an AC.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday September 24 2014, @09:58PM
icraziness is stupid. if you want new phone announcements, there is another site for you (fuck beta!)
bending of phones till they plastically deform is an engineering problem, which is more deserved on a tech news site than many of the other stories... did you try wave charging your brain or something?
(Score: 2) by n1 on Wednesday September 24 2014, @10:11PM
I saw the story about the update after this story was accepted. If a story covering the update problem had been submitted, it would have probably been merged with this one. We did run a story the other day covering the lengths Apple goes to ensure quality in the manufacturing of its devices. This could be seen as a followup to that, was all that effort and expense really worth it?
Would it have been acceptable, if we merged this bending submission and the hypothetical update submission? There's still time to submit the iOS update problems as a story, if that's the real story here.
That's what SoylentNews is about, it's the submissions and comments from the community that makes the site and the narrative, not the editorial team.
(Score: 2) by tangomargarine on Wednesday September 24 2014, @10:29PM
Can somebody do me a favor and round up anybody who has ever decided to call a scandal X-gate? We'll line them all up and I'll throw them out of a fourth-floor window one at a time.
I can figure out whether something is a scandal without putting fucking "-gate" on the end every single damn time! Popular definition of what constitutes a "scandal" is stupid, too. Prince Charles got a haircut?! Haircutgate!!
"Is that really true?" "I just spent the last hour telling you to think for yourself! Didn't you hear anything I said?"
(Score: 2) by Nerdfest on Wednesday September 24 2014, @11:16PM
Shouldn't this be called "Bend-gazi" or something?
(Score: 2) by Magic Oddball on Thursday September 25 2014, @11:17AM
Oh, boy, if I could, I would, as that it drives me up the wall as well.
That said, I don't think that any of the major scandals of the last year or two have been referred to as "__gate." I can't tell if it's because the long-standing fad/tradition is finally fading away into history, or if it's just that none of the words relating to recent scandals would sound even half-decent with "gate" tacked onto the end.
(Score: 2) by JeanCroix on Thursday September 25 2014, @01:55PM
(Score: 2) by tangomargarine on Thursday September 25 2014, @02:26PM
I think the only way we could avoid the -gate is if the actual word ended in -gate to begin with. Watergategate?
"Is that really true?" "I just spent the last hour telling you to think for yourself! Didn't you hear anything I said?"
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday September 25 2014, @05:47PM
They have been a few [wikipedia.org].
There's at least Bridgegate, Gamergate, Pastagate, Weinergate, Homeworkgate, Sodagate, Donglegate, Benghazigate, and as of recently, Salutegate. Of course, YMMV on what constitutes a "major" scandal.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday September 25 2014, @12:29PM
Would that be defenistrategate or perhaps defenisgate?
(Score: 2) by JeanCroix on Thursday September 25 2014, @01:58PM
(Score: 3, Funny) by halcyon1234 on Thursday September 25 2014, @01:11AM
Original Submission [thedailywtf.com]
(Score: 2) by mtrycz on Thursday September 25 2014, @12:23PM
They should make a youtube show for this.
In capitalist America, ads view YOU!