iPhone 5S screw length trap

[Bud]

On a same note, there is what seems to be a deficiency in iPod and iPhone design. It could also may had been done deliberately, who knows. It is the Home and other buttons that appear to break and cause a wide spread problem, and that is because the tiny snap dome SMT buttons in the device for God knows what reason have an even more tiny plastic tip on top of the dome. The outside buttons press against that tiny tip that transfers force to the dome apex. If the tip breaks, the outside button can not any longer reach the dome an the button stops working.
A picture is attached below with the Home snap dome button is circled in Red.

The height of the tip is very small, so to repair a dead button, something has to be glued on top of the dome and that something has to be really small and thin. There are videos on youtube showing people glueing thin metal shims or  applying a drop of crazy glue. What I did I applied 3 small square pieces of aluminum sticky tape. Put two layers on the back of the Home button and one on top of the snap dome button, as shown in the attached photo. You can imagine how thin the original plastic tip was if all that was required to repair the damn thing was three layers of aluminum tape.

Now look at the back of the outside Home button in the photo - it has a aluminum round plate embedded in soft rubber. How hard was it to make that plate to have a little stamped rise in the center? That would totally addressed the problem. Well, guess what, that would reduce sales, since people would not need to buy replacement devices.

[IanB]

I have seen "professional repair techs" on YouTube making a complete bodge of iPhone disassembly and reassembly. If you are going to take something like that apart for repair, you ought to know how to do it right.