My tribute to carbon

[a1point8turbo]

My tribute to carbon ***Updated** 56k Stay Away lol

**UPDATED**
My tribute to Hrshycro

He gave me the inspiration, insight and pointed me in the right direction. I think the Incredible is a little harder because of the multiple steps(as in different heights in the battery door).

~Sorry some of the pictures I didn't adjust APTR so the focus is very centered and very bokha~

Step 1: Supplies

- X-Acto Knife kit with a High Quality Number 11 blade (precision cuts) and a Number 5 blade(cutting less delicate parts).

- Alcohol wipes (or cotton ball with Rubbing Alcohol) to clean off grease and finger prints.

-Microfiber wipe

- Marker, gel pen & mechanical pencil

- Di-Noc Carbon Fiber 3M Material HERE

-Heat gun (blow dryer works also just not as well)

- Primer 94 by 3M, bonding material so that the Di-Noc sticks better.

Step 2:

Tracing a Pattern

First with the inside of the battery door facing down on top of the material take a black marker and mark the center of the camera hole.

Then take the battery door out of the way and use your mechanical pencil to indent the material so that when you flip i over you can see where the center of the opening will be.

This way when you flip it over you know how to align your door for tracing.

Once that is done flip the material over (white side up) and place the outside of the battery door face down on the material. Go ahead and line up that divot or indent as best as you can with the center of the camera hole.

Mark out a cross in that hole and use your marker to fill in the flash holes and the speaker phone hole. See this larger picture(s) for reference:

 

[a1point8turbo]

Cont....

Again once you have it lined up you can go ahead and trace around the phone. Then retrace but give your self 3mm - 4mm of spacing and one more time creating three different outlines like the pictures above. I used the pencil and then marked good reference points with the marker or gel pen.

Step 3:

Clean the battery door inside and out to remove all finger prints, dust, ect.

The cleaner your battery door the better the material will stick!

Step 4:

Prep with Primer 94 (optional but provides a much better adhesion)

Let dry

Step 5: Application

Before applying the material to the battery door cut some slits (5-6 like a pizza) towards the center of the camera hole, poke a hole for the flash holes and cut a slit for the speaker phone.

This way when you stick it on the battery door you can peal the "pizza slices" over onto the inside and it should look like a sun (reference Pimp my ride for how the pull material over corners, speaker boxes, ect.)

Star applying the material to the phone making sure your edges are lined up with your pattern and your camera and flash holes also line up.

Notice I haven't even heated the material up yet and it is sticking really well and filling the "steps" in really well. Just go around with your finger and try to force the material to outline into the steps and channels/grooves, ect. You can also "peal back" your slits into the inside of the case for the camera hole. Later on you will trim these off but they serve a purpose of helping to keep everything aligned.

If you are having trouble getting the material to sit into the steps and channels now is the time you can apply some heat to give the material some flex and help it form to the battery door. Again we are heating up the material not melting it So use caution.

You will have material hanging over the edge at this time and that's good. It gives you something to pull on to make sure the material is nice and tight around the door.

Now with my first one it was a learning experience on the corners ( by far the hardest part). At first I was cutting slits and pulling the little pizza slices over but that gave the corners a rough or jagged (like fish scales) feel. The second time around I heated up the material and pulled very hard while making sure it didn't un-stick or un-form anywhere else. This ended up giving a nice fitted look but took a lot of patience and practice. Keep the material warm and flexible to pull this off its not easy.

So the take away here is leave maybe more material on the corners so you have something to hold onto while you stretch the material over the edge!

Step 6 scroll down in the thread I forgot to save a few post marks!

 

[wild style]

Wow this looks amazing! Looking forward to the more detailed post.

 

[Kyle Gibb]

very cool, would be an awesome design for a case. Maybe get into contact with some case maker like sedio?

 

[jdazzr]

Nice!!!! looks sick dude

 

[rpfarrah]

Cool. Nice job.

 

[NIKSTORM]

I Love it!!!!! Only thing is......is there a way to slightly raise the edge around the camera lens to stop from scratching it up when the phone is put down?

 

[bigdds]

very cool, nice work

 

[rosariorose9]

Beautiful!!

 

[a1point8turbo]

Step 6: Trimming and touch ups

First remove the chrome headphone jack ring, it pops out fairly easily.

This will allow you to poke through the material and then trim around the black plastic where the chrome ring goes. You will do this trimming after you get the edges trimmed!! So just hang onto to that chrome ring and wait for the instructions below.

When trimming the excess material do this using the number 11 blade. This isn't that hard of a part its just time consuming. Go slow, look twice before you cut. Make sure to be weary of the locking tabs and give those a little more room from the material.

There is really no way to describe how to do this part. I basically followed the edge of the battery door and trimmed more and more off until I was really close. Then did more of a shaving action until I had the material trimmed right to the edge. Again by the clips you need to trim slightly more.
****BY NO MEANS SHOULD YOU TRIM SO FAR THAT YOU SEE THE ORIGINAL BATTERY DOOR MATERIAL ON THE SIDE!

The only things that should be sticking up is the clips/tabs that hook onto the phone.


Keep putting the battery door on the phone and trim where it needs trimming. Cut around the volume button and the power button, just follow the contour of the battery door frame.

Back to that Camera hole we cut earlier. This was something I learned on the fly. At first I was just going to leave the pizza slices attached. But it didn't make it look round and at all it gave it a stop sign look. If you look at this picture you can see the top where I trimmed the pizza slices off (by going around the inside of the hole with the number 11 blade) has a nice circle look. So again bottom = pizza slices, top = trimmed. Moral....eat the pizza slices and trim them off!

After some more trimming and test fitting I went ahead and cut trimmed out the flash holes with the very tip of the number 11 blade as well as the speaker hole.

Pre- Flash Hole Trim

Post Trim

 

[a1point8turbo]

Cont...

Chrome Ring

Pre Trim w/ the chrome headphone jack ring out:

After using the tip of the #11 blade and putting the ring back in place:

Some more trimming and then used a collar stay to round of the edge of the material and poke it under the ring so that it didn't look so chopped up:

All done, some more test fitting and some more minute trimming and I got it just right!!

Enjoy the pictures!

 

[a1point8turbo]

Thats All Folks! I love it, works great, looks great!

Preview of V2.0 Trimming out so that the "HTC" chrome logo appears.

First step, color in HTC logo

Second step, stamp logo on material

Step Three, Use mechanical pencil tip to emboss the logo for cutting.....

Stay Tuned!

 

[a1point8turbo]

Place Holder

 

[ezun]

This is amazing. a few questions:
1) Can you please show the inside of the battery cover? I'd like to see how the outside edges are trimmed.
2) it looks like you have a new back cover for V2.0. Is that right or did you just clean off the other one? If you cleaned it off, can you let us know how you removed this - so I can do the same if I screw it all up?

 

[jasonb]

that's sexy! i love me some carbon fiber.

 

[a1point8turbo]

This is amazing. a few questions:
1) Can you please show the inside of the battery cover? I'd like to see how the outside edges are trimmed.
2) it looks like you have a new back cover for V2.0. Is that right or did you just clean off the other one? If you cleaned it off, can you let us know how you removed this - so I can do the same if I screw it all up?

When I get home today I will try to snap some more pictures for you.

The pictures are a mix of 2 different attempts, I haven't taken any of the Di-Noc off yet because I can source battery doors easily but I would think If you gave it some heat it would come off fairly easily. I planned on trying to cut out the htc logo tonight but got tied up so it will have to wait until Sunday.

If there was residue left over after rating it off I am sure goo gone would do the trick!

 

[Qazme]

You have done an amazing job so far man! Great work, looks really nice. Hope you got a sharp knife you may have some people wanting these

 

[willymakit]

Looks great,nice job.

 

[LR7]

Man, I cant wait to see the HTC logo complete.

 

[gabetron]

wow great job man, I love this kinda diy stuff