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Consumer Reports: New iPhones Not As Bendy As Believed
An anonymous reader writes: Over the past several days, we've been hearing reports about some amount of users noticing that their brand new iPhone 6 Plus is bending in their pockets. The pictures and videos shown so far have kicked off an investigation, and Consumer Reports has done one of the more scientific tests so far. They found that the iPhone 6 Plus takes 90 pounds of pressure before it permanently deforms. The normal iPhone 6 took even less: 70 lbs. They tested other phones as well: HTC One (M8): 70 lbs, LG G3: 130 lbs, iPhone 5: 130 lbs, Samsung Galaxy Note 3: 150 lbs. The Verge also did a report on how Apple torture-tests its devices before shipping them. Apple's standard is about 55 lbs of pressure, though it does so thousands of times before looking for bends. One analysis suggests that Apple's testing procedure only puts pressure on the middle of the phone, which doesn't sufficiently evaluate the weakened area where holes have been created for volume buttons. Consumer Reports' test presses on the middle of the device as well.
<tt>Consumer Reports: The iPhone users wearing skinny jeans aren't really as skinny as they believed.</tt>
The World is Yours.
As is the case a lot (not all) of the time with Apple. They're worth a lot in click-bait, so what you do is try to find something outrageous to say about a popular product, put adverts on the page to generate you cash, and try and profit from the massive public interest in yet another Apple product...
Or maybe I'm getting too cynical in my old age.
Simon
Physicists get Hadrons!
I agree with you it should be free of charge if there is a defect, and it would have to be counted as one if they claimed it could survive > 90lbs of force, but that wasn't a claim. Realistically, if it was a free replacement, how do you get away from the "I nicked my iPhone dropping it out of my car, let me bend it and get a new one" crowd?
Read it again. People are accustomed to treating their iPhones in a certain way (storage-wise), but the 6 bends at nearly HALF the pressure of the 5. That's the crux of the problem. The 6 is a step backwards in strength. The larger size in part of it, since there's more leverage potential, but LG and Samsung seem to have solved that problem. No, it's not made of cheese, as some users seem to have reported, but it will bend under circumstances that the 5 would not.
how do you get away from the "I nicked my iPhone dropping it out of my car, let me bend it and get a new one" crowd?
1. Examine old phone carefully for damage
2. Damage the new phone in the same way (minus the bend), before handing it to the customer.
Who thinks it's okay to sit on their phone? Why do people think they ought to be able to? It literally makes no sense. It's an electronic device with a glass screen. If I handed someone a sheet of glass and said, "put this in your back pocket and sit on it!" they'd refuse.
But a phone? Oh, absolutely! Shit, wait, no! It broke?!?!
STOP . AMERICA . NOW
One analysis? Every documented case of the issue shows that the bending occurs at a specific weakpoint that is not in the middle of the device. What fucking idiot would test for this weakness by only bending the device in the middle?
Consumer Reports' test presses on the middle of the device as well. Oh joy, a whole team of professional fucking idiots.
When there are plenty of competing devices on the market that are more bendy (as they discovered), it seems entirely reasonable to place your product in the middle of the accepted, reasonable range.
I mean, HTC are advertising their phone as not bending when you sit down, and explicitly comparing it to the iPhone, while these tests demonstrate that it's in fact more bendable.
Also true for if a 250lb man puts it in his back pocket... unless he also happens to put a ball bearing in his back pocket and then applies all his weight to that one precise spot.
Really... a person's weight != the force placed on a specific spot on an object a person has in their pocket. The entire reason we sit down is to distribute the force along our hips and thighs.
You might have a point if people were standing on their iPhones while they were suspended between two bricks.
Of course, what worried me (and this is where you can get a legit comparison) is that a six year old kid or a medium size dog CAN generate 150lb of force pretty easily.
Here's one data point for you: I've carried an un-protected iPod Touch 4g in my back pocket since around 2010 -- no scratches, no bends. The thing is about the same thickness as the iPhone 6 (0.26 in thick vs iPhone 0.27 in), and only a slightly smaller form factor. I've only come close to putting 50lbs of force on a single point a few times (landing on a pointy rock) -- result was that it got some stuck pixels for a few days that eventually returned to normal.
Wait, wait, wait...
iPhone 5: 130lbs. force to deform
iPhone 6+: 90 lbs. force to deform -> 30% less force
iPhone 6: 70 lbs. force to deform -> 46% less force
A reduction in resistance to deformation of nearly one third to one half over previous models and they are supposedly "not as bendy as believed"? WTF? That's a recall class problem in my book.
Is it? So if I design a phone that can withstand 1 ton, then I am not allowed to ship any phone that withstand less than that or it's a recall? Man, come on. If the thing is too weak for regular use, it's case for a recall. If not, it's not a case for a recall. Nothing to do with "is it weaker than the latest model".
Write boring code, not shiny code!
You make a phone that can't be bent by being left in someone's pocket, so that if it is bent, it clearly was damage beyond the scope of the warranty?
You are in a maze of twisty little relative jumps, all alike.
It doesn't take much pressure at all to bend/break an iPhone 6 Plus: https://www.youtube.com/watch?...
Applying a point of pressure in the middle tests general structural integrity. It won't test any specific cutout areas that well (like the volume buttons), but as a general stress test, it does quite well, especially as the testers do continual repeated tests, not just one test in the center. They're testing for materials fatigue and deformation due to torque, as well as impact. Good general test.
But I agree; they should also be testing potential weak points to see how they perform. I'd expect them to do significantly better, as the structure is much more rigid but with the same tensile strength near the edges (less leverage).
but the 6 bends at nearly HALF the pressure of the 5
Neither figure matters if the pressure actually put on the phone in your pocket is 1/10th of 55 lbs.
To phrase it differently since you seem to have a personality tailor-made for being "misled by statistics", if the only force a device undergoes is 10-20lbs, why does it matter if a device can sustain a million pounds of force, or 30,
Remember that in realty Apple's has reports of just six actual phones being bent.
I have a 6plus and have been using it in my pocket. After sitting or leaning over or whatever, there is zero bend or even flex to the thing. To actually bend it would take enough force I'd be concerned about my own structural integrity.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
Who in their right mind puts 70 lbs of force on their $700 device?
but /. articles initiate a lot of static in the information band.
No, but customers who have bought previous versions will have an expectation that the new one will survive being used (and abused) in the same manner as their old phone.
If I'm used to putting my phone into the same pocket as my wallet (which is rounded with change)*, then it's *somewhat* reasonable to expect to be able to do as before.
* I've never that done because I've never wanted to risk damaging my phone. However I did damage an old resistive touchscreen WinMobile phone in my [non-skinny] jeans pocket because of too much pressure from my leg, so I learnt early on to be careful.
So, if the phones are bending in real world situations, they are by definition defective
Except they aren't.
Apple sold 10 *million* phones over the weekend. Of those, Apple says they have six complaints. And we haven't seen that many pictures from real owners.
So the reality is that the iPhone 6 is not defective, a few have undergone more extreme forces than is reasonable. In the end a large flat object can be broken, that's just physics and no amount of design will change that.
If you plan to put ANY phone through more extreme forces than normal, get an Otterbox and call it a day.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v...
The guy from Unbox Therapy, angry at the accusations that his original video was somehow staged, just posted a new video yesterday. In the new video, he unwraps a brand new iPhone 6+ on the street in Toronto with a handful of random witnesses watching, and again - by placing his thumbs on the back of the phone and applying moderate pressure- IMMEDIATELY produces a 25-30 degree bend in the unit, with the crease forming again at the bottom of the volume control cutouts.
In the new video, the iPhone deformed so badly the screen separated from the body.
He then attempted to bend a Moto X (2014 model) with visibly considerable force applied to it, and couldn't.
Is this really important? You decide. A lot of people - men, particularly - have carried their smartphones in the pockets of their jeans. If you're a big guy, and you have a tiny iPhone 5S in your back pocket and sit down in your car on a 3 hour road trip, the iPhone 5S won't deform because it's thicker, and much shorter in length, therefore providing a much shorter lever for your rump to apply force to. The iPhone 6+ however, being both thinner and significantly taller, provides a much longer lever for your 200+ pounds of man ass to press against the back of the car seat, making it quite conceivable that the iPhone 6+ WOULD have a bending problem in actual consumer use.
This issue has gotten enough viral traction and major media attention that it isn't going to go away. Worse yet for Apple is that unlike Antennagate, this problem won't be solved with a rubber bumper case costing Apple 20 cents manufacturing cost - NO, bent iPhone 6+ units still within their return period or covered by AppleCare are going to cost the company $200+ per unit, according to recent teardown parts costing estimates.
When, as educated tech consumers, are people going to stop confusing "smaller and thinner" as being "more advanced" ? All we are doing here, people, is sacrificing durability and battery life.
THIS SPACE INTENTIONALLY LEFT BLANK.
Torque is what matters.
If you test bending in the middle, you put 70 pounds force (approximately 300 newtons) in the middle, and support the ends firmly. That means that if the weakest point is in the middle, the torque on that point is (2 x 150 newtons x 80 mm), as the length of the lever arm to the support at the edge is about 80 mm. We'll ignore the fact that the test support is really a little bit inside that, and assume that the subject is supported right at the edge. Note also that the force is 150 newtons, which is half of the 70 pounds force used to break the phone, because the force is opposed evenly by two supports. Their equal force is then summed, which is why our total torque has that "2" scalar, giving us a total of 24 newton-meters of torque.
If we bend off-center, such as half-way towards one of the ends, the forces on the test supports are no longer equal. Our lever arms are now 120 and 40 mm, and the force would be unevenly distributed as well. The force is distributed inversely to the length of the lever arms, so the short arm, being 25% of the length, now supports 75% of the load, which is 225 newtons. The long arm supports 25%, which is 75 newtons. This gives us a total torque of (225 newtons * 40mm + 75 newtons * 120mm), for a total of only 18 newton-meters of torque.
Since testing off-center actually applies less torque to the test subject, the question then becomes one of whether the weak point is really 25% weaker than the rest of the beam.
However, we can also compute the torque on the supposed weak point during the center test. In that case, the lever arms can be computed as though they behave as a typical lever, scaling the force. they apply. The longer lever would be a class 3 lever, which would reduce the effective force of the test to 100 newtons. On the other hand, the shorter arm would behave as a class 2 lever, increasing the force to 300 newtons. The total torque on the weak point during a center test, then, is (100 newtons * 120mm + 300 newtons * 40mm), which is again 24 newton-meters.
If the weak point were really weaker than anywhere else in the phone, it would break during the center-loaded test. Looking at the pictures from Consumer Reports, though, that's exactly what happened. On both the iPhone 6 and iPhone 6 Plus, the most significant damage is at the edge of the volume buttons closest to the center.
However, it's worth noting that the Consumer Reports test was conducted until the screen detached, even if that happened after the phone itself was permanently deformed. Looking at other pictures of bent phones, their screens have not separated from the cases, so they likely used less force to deform. Bending to separation, though, provides a consistent point of comparison to other phones, which may have internal damage even if their cases return to normal.
Disclaimer: I am not a physicist, and not a test engineer. If my math or methodology is incorrect, please feel free to tell me why.
You do not have a moral or legal right to do absolutely anything you want.
Apple needs to get their ruggedness act together. Meanwhile, here's a real phone, the Caterpillar B15.
Cat B15 tested by users. Dragged behind car. Used to play basketball. (As the ball, not as a computer game.) Dropped off bridge. Run through cement mixer. Frozen in bucket of ice. Run over by car. No problem.
Cat B15 tested by Caterpillar. Dropped into pool of water. Scooped out with heavy equipment. Run over by front end loader. (One of Cat's smaller front end loaders.) No problem.
It's an Android phone. The B15 runs Android 4.2; the new B15Q runs Android 4.4. Price around $300. Available in the US at Home Depot. Unlocked; pick any GSM carrier. T-Mobile works. No annoying carrier-provided apps. Caterpillar preloads apps for ordering Caterpillar heavy equipment parts and renting heavy equipment.
If you have one of these in a pocket, you will break before it will. I carry one of these horseback riding.
So if you're use to sitting on the hood of a 70s (or older) truck and then buy a new one and sit on the hood and you find your butt caused a dent in the new truck's hood then all trucks should be recalled?
Have gnu, will travel.
How mush pressure does it take accounting for body heat? How must does it change for a person who is sweating ? Is this a parameter they test for as well?? How about say rubbing? If a person had the phone in there back pocket it surly is rubbing up and down as a person walks. Or a poor mix of whatever the iphone is made of? don't know I don't own a iphone. Plastic? Bad mixture to save money? metal? mixture changed to save money? Shit most of the stainless steel we get from communist country's is magnetic. Stainless steel is not magnetic.
Jack of all trades,master of none
" This is confirmation, not as bendable as believed!"
Correct, it's even more bendable. The iPhone 5 could take nearly double the force.
Which means the phone got weaker structurally with the upgrade.
Still waiting on Serviscope_minor to wake up to fucking reality and realize that Jessica Price isn't going to fuck him.
.
While the iPhone 5, the LG G3, and the Samsung Galaxy Note 3 are much better in this regard (all >= 130 pounds), with the Samsung Galaxy Note 3 at the top of the tests with 150 pounds.
No, it isn't. To properly calculate 'bendability' you have to calculate force moments around the points where it actually bends. If you take a look at the bendgate photos, you'll see that it bends and breaks at the lower end of the volume buttons. This point is about one third down, and the phone is 157mm long, so you have the bending force acting on a lever about 105mm long. Since the torque is proportional to the square of the lever, a much smaller force would be necessary to bend it there than in the middle. Since both consumer reports and Apple apply the force in the middle of the phone, they'll show you a larger force necessary to bend it.
Unfortunately, in your pocket the phone will eventually hit a place where the smaller force will be applied in the "right" spot and it will bend.
I wouldn't ever carry a bare phone or one with just a silicone bumper in a front pocket
I have for years without issue.
And that includes the iPhone plus.
Theres simply not enough force to even come close to flexing the phone, much less bending...
Back pockets are I think more worrisome but even there - the Plus (as the tests show) is pretty damn rigid.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
What the test shows is that most phones will resist a reasonable amount of bending when the load is applied uniformly at the centre. They all do pretty well. That's great.
The issue with the iPhone 6 Plus is that it has a weak corner, if you watch the 'bendgate' video you can clearly see that the bend line is not straight across the phone, but at an angle near to the weak spot.
A properly designed test would have clamped each phone flat with a corner sticking out unsupported and force applied until it suffered plastic deformation (stays bent). Each phone could have all four corners tested and the weakest result is the 'winner'. In such a test the iPhone 6 Plus would clearly fail at its weak point much more readily than any of the others.
Bad science.
"Our opponent is an alien starship packed with atomic bombs," I said. "we have a protractor"
I don't really understand why Consumer Report doesn't know the difference between force and mass. You measure force in Newtons (N) and mass in kilograms (kg) or, even less scientific because it's not a SI unit, pounds (lb).
-- Cheers!
Have you instrumented your ass, because you have nothing, at all, to back up that assertion.
Android phones bend too.
As anyone could have found with Google before they tried to make this a thing about Apple.
Just be aware and it'll be fine, with any phone.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley