Dude fixes his iPhone’s broken glass screen by himself – the ghetto broken display fix method
By Will Park on Tuesday, September 18th, 2007 at 6:04 PM PST In Apple, Devices
While this isn’t the first shattered glass display that we’ve seen from the iPhone world, it certainly has the funniest outcome. Too bad this guy didn’t get a free replacement from Apple (NSDQ: AAPL).
Epic Proportions over at the Something Awful forums wasn’t having any of Apple’s $300-to-replace-your glass-overlay nonsense. Like a true DIY soldier, Epic replaced his broken iPhone’s glass screen (with some clear plastic) all by himself. Armed with a razor blade, some 1/32 inch clear plastic, a dremel rotary tool, scissors, permanent marker, and a healthy dose of “anger, spite, and an imagination,” Epic managed to replace the broken glass overlay with a custom-cut clear plastic piece.
Sure it’s ghetto. Sure it looks funny. But it’s a worthwhile interim solution until iPhone parts start to come down in price.
Quick tip: we keep our iPhone’s glass screen facing inward, towards our thigh, when we keep it in our pocket – a dented casing is much easier to deal with than a broken glass display. We’re sure Epic would have done well to follow that advice.
[Via: Into iPhone]
i think it looks cool
realy 
i gues i’m gonna order my pice of plexi right now, just in case 
Good to know when mine’s broken
altough it’s not very nice…
where did you get the 1/32 plexiglass, i tried every hardware store and they don’t carry it…
help!! 
hiii… i just broke my iphone glass… any idea where do i get the glass from..??? pls hlp..
A CD case works perfectly instead of buying the plexiglass. I am sure everyone can find a cd case lying around
I broke my screen yesterday, and just finished replacing it. looks almost as good as new.
Question… when you replace the glass, what actually holds it in place? do you have to drop a little glue or does the phone have brackets that it slips into?
Thanks.
yeah I broke my iphone screen from having it in my pocket when carrying a music equipment flight case… but the damage wasn’t quite so bad and none of the glass fell out, I taped over the broken area with clear parcel tape and the touch sensitivity still works fine.
A CD case / plastic cover will get so easily scratched.
Apple’s repair price is a total rip-off.
I am in the same situation. I put a thin yet sturdy film over the whole, taped it nicely with regular cellotape and put one of those protective sillicon things around it. I hope it will hold well.
Does your still work in the same condition?
Hey, just a tip. I used black electricians tape instead of a black sharpy. I am also checking into getting a piece of tempered glass cut from a glass place. We’ll see how it goes….
i just tried this technique, and the phone looks brand new! the screen looks awsome, but… the touch dosent work,, so, i pritty much cant do anything.. any suggestions?
Hi everybody !
I tried to do the same operation but my iPhone died durring the operation.
The touch screen under the “glue” has been broken…
If you try to do the same be carefull it is very thin and fagil !
See you !
hi! i also tried to change z broken glass with a new one. but as soon as the replacement was over, i switched it on, and to my surprise, z touch system is no more working. can anyone help me plz…. czad916@hotmail.com
thanks…
z original glass can be obtained on ebay. it is from there itself that i bought mine, but its not working…..!! help plz….! thanks!
Nice tutorial. I used it to give it a try myself. I’ve posted a similar tutorial for replacing the broken glass with one of the replacement glass screens they have on ebay now. Check it out at: http://www.hitchsource.com/blog/2008/06/fixing-the-broken-glass-on-my-iphone/
Kenja
hahaha … I’d do the same thing in a heart beat. Why the fuck is the phone glass replacement 300 dollars? That’s ridiculous, the phone its self cost 600. That’s jacked.
You can get replacement iPhone front glass from Kokopelli Music (www.kokopellimusic.us) for just $29.99.
This is lie…i tried remove glass from LCD and LCD has broke. its almost imposible remove glass from LCD…its glued…my iphone death and im pissed…dont do it at home…trust me
It actually works,it worked great for me thats what i can say…
Andy ,if it didnt work for you it diesnt mean it aint work at all ,its all about taking some time for removing the glass thats it and if u didnt take that time and brpke the lcd its your fault so dont complain dude.
Salam
my glass was shattered, but the touchscreen works. I bought a self adhesive privacy film and that is holding it all together for $12 or so.
hey all of u my glass just broke today and i love my phone very much but i got some problems
1. im not living in the US
and
2. is this true ? and what is it about andy’s screen how long time did u guys wait ?
oh.. and what the hell is a “LCD”?
thanks for the help cya
Buy the glass cover on ebay OEM…
NEVER PURCHASE AN EXTENDED WARRANTY FOR ANY APPLE PRODUCT! THE WARRANTY DOES NOT COVER ANYTHING! I HATE GREEDY APPLE! i am going to take a hammer and smash my ipone and post it on youtube. apple is greedy! i went to the apple store and they would not work with me. i had a crack and i told the people at apple that my glass was never hit or anything. my glass broke from just regular use. all i wanted apple to do was give me a discount on a new phone (they will not fix any problem with any apple product!). they would not even give my 10% off! apple sux!!!
you can always give it a try…….worst thing is that you have to replace glass+digitizer and lcd right???????
You can also to make that back look like original I phone, use black spray paint and you will not be able to tell hardly if at all its been replaced by plastic, also add a screen protector and it will not scratch.
true John!apple support does suck. i have called several times about my broken glass and the tell me to BUY A NEW PHONE! what the hell!
Look on ebay for cheap parts
who gives a discount if you break something that you already bought from them?
thats preposterous and bad business, what a nice world it would be if people did do that, it would be so sweet of them. but things don’t work that way, apple does just fine and all companies are greedy, when they aren’t they go out of business
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dude! oem iphone glass available on ebay for 14.88. i just replaced mine. plexiglass ? brain surgeons !
The glass replacement is the hardest most time consuming and possibly the worst replacement you can tackle. Easiest way is to just buy a replacement digitizer/lcd/glass in one and install it already built. They go for around $150 bucks. You can buy a replacement glass only for around $20 bucks and gamble in trying to replace only the glass on your phone but dont be surprised it doesn’t work once you do remove the old glass and power it up.
i broke the glass only and want to repair. how? Is the glass pasted in the lcd, so it becomes dificul to extract with the glue?
Hahaha, that hillarious! And it acually still works? Love it!
I found a really cheap digitizer+front panel on dealextreme for just under $24 including shipping. It took forever for it to arrive, well over two weeks, but my phone still worked so I had the time.
I took pictures as I repaired it, you can see them and a pretty thorough desription on my blog: http://pappmaskin.no/2009/09/repair-a-broken-iphone-3g-glass-front-panel/
It wasn’t that hard to replace the glass front panel, it took me perhaps an hour or so of actual work (and a bit more spent thinking and scratching my head
.
You should at least TRY repairing it yourself before sending it in or buying a new phone.
Ya, I tried doing this on my own. More trouble than it was worth. I found myself with broken glass and now a broken LCD. Thank goodness for http://www.iphone3gscreenrepair.com. They had my phone repaired and back to me for only $69.99. For those not tech savvy or those who do not want to be without a phone very long (no LCD=no phone) I recommend using them.