You can use sous vide to help iPhone repairs, but please don't

It turns out that you can unglue an iPhone using sous vide to start screen repairs. While interesting, repairing an iPhone using a water bath is fraught with peril.

An iPhone in a sous vide bath - Image credit: u/Ziztur/Reddit

Repairing an iPhone means having to tackle Apple's famous use of adhesives. Apple is known for being extremely... generous... when applying glue to its products to hold components together and keep water out.

It turns out that you can use a very hot water bath to soften that adhesive, assuming you take proper protections and are a little bit lucky.

In a Tuesday post to Reddit's r/SousVide subreddit, user Ziztur posted photos of an attempt to replace the screen of an iPhone, by using sous vide.

Sous vide is a cooking technique where food is placed in a bag under vacuum, then immersed in a water bath to cook slowly and at a low and very precise temperature. This can result in things like perfectly cooked steaks, expertly tempered chocolate, and fantastic poached eggs.

And brewing beverages too, but we'll talk about that in the future.

Anyway, in the post, Ziztur explains that the screen broke on his iPhone, and they wanted to replace the display by themselves. However, the repair kit instructions were clear that ithe screen would need to be heated up to between 176F and 212F to make the adhesive pliable.

Lacking a heating device made for this specific purpose, as well as doubting the ability to control the temperatures of a heat gun, they turned to sous vide. The iPhone was placed into a vacuum bag and then into a water bath set to reach 197F, but it was pulled earlier at 180F.

The screen reportedly pried off the rest of the iPhone's body with ease.

Ziztur's notes jokingly add that there was no seasoning necessary for the cook, and that searing "would be overkill," referring to the usual final treatment of food cooked in this way.

Commentary from others in the subreddit followed similar lines, including one being glad that butter wasn't included in the bag. Another claimed that the iPhone was overcooked because "the interior is completely grey!" while a third said it could be deglazed with rubbing alcohol and to serve with rice.

Funny, if impractical

The editorial team at AppleInsider, in particular the authors of this piece, uses sous vide techniques frequently. We highly recommend it as a way to get great results from food that would benefit from slow cooking, but suffer from boiling.

With Wi-Fi-connected wands that are app-controlled from $138 on Amazon, and even a name-brand Bluetooth starter one from $65, it's also something that is relatively inexpensive to try out. We don't recommend buying from brands with too many adjacent consonants in the branding, but other than that, it's hard to go wrong.

However, while it can have applications beyond cookery, we cannot recommend using it to weaken the glue holding an iPhone together. A large part of it is that you're hoping a vacuum bag will be sealed correctly before immersing it into water, the natural enemy of electronics.

While the Reddit OP here used a proper vacuum bag and seal, they also used 180F temps. This is more than a Ziploc will take without blowing out a seam, and it's effectively the limit of the plastics used here, assuming it was a good brand.

We commend the post for thinking differently, but the right tools for the job are readily available. The repair mavens at iFixit have several nice sets, and Apple itself has pricey ones through its Self Repair Program.



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