Samsung Flip Amputation & Duct-tape Case

When I first decided to get a cell phone, people said that flip phones break. They were right. My Samsung 3500's flip stopped working reliably within 8-9 months. It was ok, because it was still under warranty. Any day I'll get over to the Sprint store and get it taken care of. It still worked enough; people could hear me talk, and if I held the phone *just right* I could hear them.

To the point:

  • I can't hear anybody, so my phone is just a big pager now
  • I waited too long (warranty expired)
  • It'll cost $100 to fix
  • I can get a new BETTER phone for $80

    I don't know if there's an industry word for non-flip phones: non-flippy, sans-flippy, bricky, !flip. Whatever it's called, that's what I was going to make. One evening of cracking open, poking around, confirming that it's broke, watching TV, and poking some more brought me to the conclusion that it would be neat if I re-engineered my phone in some really cool way.

    But, I'm lazy, and I have a skill with duct-tape, so I amputated that flip, soldered a jumper across the headset jack, removed the speaker from the flip, put the speaker on a post, duct-taped it all together, tested, sharpied on some numbers, and called it a night.

    More to the point:

  • It's duct-taped
  • I can hear
  • I can talk
  • It lights up
  • It's now a bricky instead of a flippy

    More Photos:


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