I’m laser cutting a wood veneer to apply to the back of my slightly cracked iPhone back. The starting point for me is the dimension drawings from Apple. You can get them here.
Rather conveniently, the drawing pdf imports into Rhino (the NURBS modeling/drafting application I use) as curves, so I don’t need to trace and redraw the dimensions.
I’m only using the inner curve from the camera back and the camera keep out guide, which recommends the distance from camera lens and flash hole to avoid vignetting or tinting your photos.
Next step was to apply 3M adhesive to a sheet of wood veneer.
- This is the back of my phone — notice the hairline cracks in the glass from dropping it a couple of weeks ago.
Always use a wrench to weigh down your wood veneer sheet in the laser cutter bed.
I decided not to etch an image on this first try, so I only vector cut the veneer and adhesive. On an Epilog Zing 16 this is 80% speed, 40% power.
Once cut out, I peeled off the backing.
I think I’ll adjust the camera/flash cutout in a little bit, this is crazy thin at the edge (due to kerf). This is the adhesive side, not sure what that straight line is all about, it’s not in the wood.
Applied to the phone back.
Very stylish self portrait of my iPhone with its new wooden back.
Posted by John Edgar Park | Filed under design, laser cutter, make
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