A Long Overdue Update (and a sneak peak at two current projects)

It's been WAY too long since my last update!  I was expecting to have a lot more to share with you a lot sooner, but I figured I should just spill the beans on everything that's been going on behind the scenes, even though it's not finished yet.  And I'm going to work on sharing things more frequently, even when I'm hitting lots of roadblocks.

First off, you might have noticed I haven't put a video out in a while.  I'm working on a couple projects at the moment, and both are kicking my butt, but I wanted to let you in on what I'm working on, and where I'm at with it.

There's this weird tension when making one of my project videos between picking a project that's too easy vs too hard.  If it's too easy, it doesn't make for a great video - I think part of what's enjoyable about these videos is watching my struggle.  But if it's too hard, or if I hit too many roadblocks, while it makes for a great story, it ends up taking WAY too long to make, and often a lot more money than I had planned.

Everything I'm working on right now is in the second set.  Which is to say - wait till you hear these stories!

This is all super hush hush, so don't go spreading it around publicly just yet, but here's what I'm working on:

#1 Adding the sim card back to the iPhone 14

This has proved WAY more difficult than I imagined.  I started with an iPhone 14, but the naive approach definitely doesn't work.  It appears there are some differences to the logic board itself, beyond just the missing sim card reader.  I've gone through a number of iterations with it, and I think I'm making headway, but I reached a wall where I really needed an iPhone 14 that had a factory installed sim card reader to compare against.  I had a friend in Canada pick one up at the apple store and overnight it to me, but it got stuck in customs for almost a week!  It finally arrived this morning, so I'm planning on cracking it open just after I finish posting this.

In parallel, I started work on doing the same thing to an iphone 14 pro, thinking it might be easier, since it's a completely different phone design, with a very different logic board (more akin to the iPhone 13, whereas the iPhone 14 was a full redesign).  Sadly, it hasn't been any easier.  I've torn an antenna cable, which nearly started a fire, and while I ordered a replacement cable, I'm probably in the market for a second iPhone 14 pro to try it on.

I'm hoping I'll have a breakthrough in the next few days, but it's something that's notoriously hard to predict.

#2 Making my own iPhone housing

This has been a goal for years now, and thanks to the Carvera mill I was given by Makera, I'm finally tackling it. It's taken me a fair bit of time to figure out how to hold the aluminum stock well for a two sided milling operation (I have to flip it over halfway through), but I'm finally getting pretty good results with a generic looking all-aluminum shell.

The next step has been accurately drawing all the internals of the shell - the screw mounts, and all sorts of holes and internal features.  I started down the route of measuring everything by hand with calipers, but that's proved challenging, so I've instead turned to something I think is pretty cool and somewhat innovative.

I just finished milling an iPhone shell down, 0.2mm at a time, and scanning it on a flatbed scanner between layers.  I aligned the layers in Photoshop + After Effects, which resulted in the animated gif you see on this post.

My next step is to import these into Fusion 360, and draw all the internal features based on them, which I'm about to start on.

Next on my list to tackle are:

- Making antenna lines - these are gaps in the aluminum of the shell that are filled with plastic which allow RF signals to escape.  I'm trying to avoid having to do injection molding (which is what they do in industry), so I'm planning on trying resin instead as an initial plan.  I have the resin on hand, and I'm hoping to run a test in the next week or so

- Making screw mounts - I'm currently working off an iPhone 12, because I happen to have a bunch of iPhone 12 parts onhand. However, I think all of the techniques I'm figuring out will be easy to apply to other models.  The iPhone 12 has a metal back panel (under the back glass) that appears to be spot welded to the aluminum frame, and then the screw mounts for the logic board and the like are spot welded to that.  Which seems like a great plan, except I can't find a source for M1.2 spot weldable screw mounts ANYWHERE.  So I'm pursuing some options including tapping my own M1.2 threads, which is frankly pretty daunting.  I've also found some thread inserts that are typically inserted into injection molded plastic with either heat or more commonly ultrasound (which creates heat), but in the past I've also successfully glued them in place.

- Anodizing - This is what gives the aluminum it's color, but as important, it gives the aluminum a hard protective layer.  I have all the supplies for doing this in the shop, and hoping to do some trial runs soon.

#3 The Robot Army

This is currently on hold, for no real other reason than I think the iPhone projects, particularly the sim card one, are a bit more time sensitive, and will get stale if I let them sit too much longer.  Thank you for all your great ideas for the robots - I can't wait to try them out once I get these other two videos done!

I've also been working on few other big projects:

#1 Hiring

I'm currently hiring for two positions:

- A camera operator/editor to work with me in my workshop here in Colorado.  We're getting some great candidates for this, and are in the later stages of interviewing.  I'm super excited to have someone working alongside me to take off a lot of the load around shooting and editing.  The job description is here if you're curious: https://www.strangeparts.com/jobs/shooter-editor/

- An international travel and production coordinator to be in charge of all the factory tour videos.  This is a pretty unique role in many ways, and we're having a harder time finding good candidates.  If you know anyone who might be a good fit, please encourage them to check out the job description and apply here: https://www.strangeparts.com/jobs/travel-production-coordinator/

#2 Planning a big trip to China

I'm working on planning a big trip back to China this spring to film at a bunch of factories, including a concept for a series I'm quite excited about.  I'm currently juggling a lot of balls trying to make this come together, between hiring, finding funding, and lining up factories.  I think it'll hopefully come together soon, and I can start locking in travel dates.

#3 Merch

We're going to start shipping out shirts and hoodies soon!  I've been working closely with the Patreon team to make sure they're top notch - I originally got some samples I wasn't super thrilled with the printing on, but we're working through it, and I think it's going to be solid in the end.  I'm waiting for a new round of samples, which hopefully will be the last iteration before we start shipping to all of you.

I appreciate all of your support and patience during this time. As always, if you have any questions or comments, please feel free to reach out to me.

Thank you for your continued support!

Safe travels,

Scotty