The iPhone Air has managed to dodge another potential "bendgate," after a YouTuber resorted to machinery to test the new model in a typical destruction-centric video.
As inevitable as the annual schedule of the iPhone range itself, so too are YouTube videos that cash in on the spectacle of damaging iPhones and other hardware. In the case of the iPhone Air, they may have a challenge on their hands.
Saturday's video from JerryRigEverything, one of the more methodical content creators in the genre, performed their battery of durability tests on Apple's thinnest model. This time around, Apple's claims about the hardiness of the iPhone Air seem to match up to YouTube reality.
The destruction video starts off with the YouTuber smearing ice cream over the front of the iPhone. This was a precursor to using some Mohs hardness picks on the front glass to try out the new Ceramic Shield 2.
Glass scratches at a level 5 or 6 with sapphire at a level 8 or 9, the voiceover explains, while the iPhone Air's screen is attacked. There are no visible scratches at a level 6, and the scratches at level 7 are "barely" visible, the host admits.
The video then moves to gratuitous shots of inspecting the iPhone Air up close with the delicate touch of a knife. Scratches and gouges appear on the sides, as you would expect, but the sound of roughing up the iPhone Air's titanium exterior is deemed less piercing than that of aluminum models.
While the glass back and the camera lens were spared any scratches, the plastic diffuser of the flash did come away with a lot of blade-based marks.
A brief session was also spent using a lighter on the front glass. But, after a brief post-flame wipe, there didn't appear to be any damage to any coatings.
Tougher than anticipated
The latter half of the video moves to the main event, the bend test. As the titanium is stronger and more elastic than aluminum, there were high hopes for the iPhone Air to do well.
Gripping the ends of the iPhone Air, placing both thumbs in the middle, a considerable effort was made to do it by hand. After trying to bend it both ways, the iPhone did curve under strain, but rebounded on release.
Of course, without the promise of gratuitous destruction that these sorts of videos thrive on, a backup plan was employed.
A more serious attempt at testing iPhone Air durability - Image Credit: JerryRigEverything/YouTube
Placed between two poles and hooked up to a crane scale, a chained pulley shifted the middle out of alignment with the ends of the iPhone. Following some cracking, the iPhone eventually bent enough to shatter the front glass at 216 pounds of strain.
On release, it was found that the back glass was amazingly still intact, but the titanium frame had a considerable kink in the middle. Amazingly, the screen was still working after the torture test.
While obviously gratuitous in nature, the damage does offer a new data point for more pedestrian uses.
That 216 pounds was focused at the center of the iPhone Air, while a person sitting on it in their back pocket will distribute the weight across the entire device. Evidently, there's less risk of damage from sitting on it than ever before.
AppleInsider does not recommend that anyone purposefully tries to do bend tests and other destructive activities on their iPhone Air unless they have a lot of spare cash they want to burn. No matter how hard you try, there's no way you'll be able to convince AppleCare+ it was all an "accident."
