Help Removing the back glass

[JCampbell]

I previously posted about wanting to replace the back glass of my N4, and I finally got around to starting the process by removing the back glass. I will have pictures up soon, but the short story is that I strongly suggest you DON'T do it. As it turns out, the black reflective surface isn't plastic, but is more of a sticky film. On the bright side, it's much easier to remove the glass than I anticipated due to the lack of epoxy. The bad news is that my phone is unusable until I replace the glass with wood. Many components, such as the Qi charging coil are immediately behind the sticky film, while others, such as the speaker grill are held only by the film. Overall I'm disappointed in the build quality from LG on the back of this phone.

 

[realizm]

I previously posted about wanting to replace the back glass of my N4, and I finally got around to starting the process by removing the back glass. I will have pictures up soon, but the short story is that I strongly suggest you DON'T do it. As it turns out, the black reflective surface isn't plastic, but is more of a sticky film. On the bright side, it's much easier to remove the glass than I anticipated due to the lack of epoxy. The bad news is that my phone is unusable until I replace the glass with wood. Many components, such as the Qi charging coil are immediately behind the sticky film, while others, such as the speaker grill are held only by the film. Overall I'm disappointed in the build quality from LG on the back of this phone.

Idle hands are the devil's workshop...

You pssed the bed, now you have to roll around in it.

Your assessment of build quality...is this before or after you ripped the back glass off that wasn't intended to be ripped off?

And just so I understand you correctly, you did this and the back glass was intact with nothing wrong with it? What possessed you to do such a thing?

Not trying to be horribly rude, just want to make sure I understand where you're coming from.

 

[JCampbell]

Idle hands are the devil's workshop...

You pssed the bed, now you have to roll around in it.

Your assessment of build quality...is this before or after you ripped the back glass off that wasn't intended to be ripped off?

And just so I understand you correctly, you did this and the back glass was intact with nothing wrong with it? What possessed you to do such a thing?

Not trying to be horribly rude, just want to make sure I understand where you're coming from.

The glass was already significantly cracked from a very short fall (~2ft) onto (albeit thin) carpet, including the part directly over the camera lens.
I wouldn't dream of doing that to a perfectly good phone.
The good news is that after removing all of the glass, the phone still works perfectly. Now for the ebony veneer to come in...

 

[MartinS]

I'll be interested to see pictures of how this turns out.

Good luck.

 

[ou7shined]

As someone who works with wood (and occasionally veneers) I'm particularly interested in this potentially awesome mod.... not that I'd set out to do it to mine.

 

[Rusty]

There is someone on XDA developers who removed the perfectly good glass from his phone, got rid of the back film and put it back together.

All because he wasn't keen on the Nexus logo:

http://forum.xda-developers.com/showpost.php?p=37069859&postcount=424

 

[SiempreTuna]

Can't wait to see the pictures! An ebony back - could start a trend .. so long as the heat + wood combination doesn't result in scalded skids, of course

 

[MartinS]

There is someone on XDA developers who removed the perfectly good glass from his phone, got rid of the back film and put it back together.

All because he wasn't keen on the Nexus logo:

http://forum.xda-developers.com/showpost.php?p=37069859&postcount=424

Well that looks terrible.

I'm a little confused, what exactly is behind the glass?

Is the glass etched with Nexus and the sparkle pattern? What's behind that, which gives the black finish?

 

[ou7shined]

All because he wasn't keen on the Nexus logo:

http://forum.xda-developers.com/showpost.php?p=37069859&postcount=424

Holy crap! That's awful.
There is no way they are going to get it better looking that stock.

 

[realizm]

Holy crap! That's awful.
There is no way they are going to get it better looking that stock.

Hey I got an idea!

Let's take the sexiest phone out there and turn it into a 3rd rate subway whore!!

 

[JCampbell]

Here's what it looks like now, sans glass but still with some film on it. It wasn't a very clean job, but it's not too bad considering I literally pried the glass off with my knife. The ebony is in my PO box now, and I should have everything done by Monday.

 

[Thats]

Wow, I really wouldn't touch this phones back glass panel now that I see what hides behind it.

Yuck.

 

[MartinS]

Can't see the picture???

 

[ou7shined]

Can't see the picture???

Some things are best left unseen.