Project: iPhone Griptape Sticker
Over the holidays I dropped my phone into the snow. Again. After cursing some, thinking some, and then cursing some more, I decided to make a backing for my phone that was less slippery than the glass or even the metal one I have. I went through a few materials (thin adhesive-backed silicone, adhesive sandpaper, and some others) when I arrived at the perfect solution that takes care of everything all at once: skateboard grip tape!
Update: These are now for sale at RF Laserworks!
Edit: Well, it looks like I didn't do enough homework before I posted these for sale! A couple angry people have told me that there's already a similar product out there. This is great! Competition is always good; the end user always ends up winning :)
Cutting this guy with a knife, though possible, was going to be a challenge if I wanted to get the perfect fit on the back of my iPhone. So I decided to use the laser cutter. I whipped up a quick drawing with help from Apple's lovely developer page and sent it to the cutter!
I carefully stuck the finished product onto my phone. Neat looking, eh? Here are a few pictures of it on.
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January 24th, 2011 - 12:13
Actually if you read the site it looks like he only discovered that there were similar products after creating this one himself. Besides it should be up to the buyer who they purchase from and if a competing product is in fact better it will probably get the sales. It’s not unusual for different people to come up with similar ideas after all.
January 23rd, 2011 - 23:21
Very cool. I kind of want to try it for my phone (an older ENV2), but I wonder about it sucking up lint from my pockets.
January 23rd, 2011 - 05:34
Wasn’t the point of that style of case that you’re not supposed to block the back of the phone? How is the signal affected?
January 23rd, 2011 - 06:35
Actually the metal content in the grip tape is practically non-existent, so one could call it EMF neutral. The “grip” on grip tape like that is usually just plain old sand. The glue holding it on gives it the color
January 22nd, 2011 - 07:04
Hmm I’m pretty sure the iphone surface will be destroyed after unsticking it. I have beed unsticking skatebard griptape several times and there is a really strong glue. Please let me know if you already tried to unstick it ;)
January 22nd, 2011 - 11:57
It would be a good idea to get a cheap sticker back for your iPhone and glue it on there, so in the case you would need to remove it, you could just peel it off.
January 22nd, 2011 - 20:04
True that grip tape sticks pretty well, but if you peel it off slowly, you allow the glue to creep and detach itself while leaving minimal or no residue. If you’re careful about removing the sticker, you’ll be able to reposition it a couple times.
January 23rd, 2011 - 06:38
WD-40 is the phage of most adhesives and probably won’t damage any coloration (glass cleaner afterward)
January 21st, 2011 - 20:13
I love it. I wouldn’t recommend kick flipping it, though. ;).
January 21st, 2011 - 23:12
Thanks! A few more times dropped and my phone would have looked like it was kick flipped heheh
January 23rd, 2011 - 06:39
My poor first gen i-touch looks like I beat a zombie down with it