So I dropped my FP4, it rolled all to the way down a concrete slope, jumping and bouncing all over.
It’s okay, I’m clumsy, I’m at peace, I figured it would happen eventually.
I do not and will not protect my phone because cases make the device bulky and ugly. I do not like cases. So yeah I saw it coming and I won’t complain.
Bottom line screen is ok-ish, I mean of course it’s scratched everywhere but I don’t really mind, they always end up scratched anyway.
Metal frame however is full of dents.
Hence my title; does anyone ever attempted to “brush” the frame with say sand paper or similar, I’d like to know if this would “soften” the dents without dealing too much damage to the frame ?
In my opinion, the aluminum frame is an anodized aluminum. Not a paint finish.
When the aluminum is sanded with sandpaper, the normal silver color of aluminium comes through.
Anyway, it will look different in any case.
I brushed it lightly with P400 sandpaper and the result on the upper part of the aluminium frame (where there are the most dents) is better. I mean it’s not fantastic but much better.
I totally forgot to take picture of “before” unfortunately so you’ll only get the “after”
However, I had to abandon the idea of doing the same to the “main” aluminium frame as it will change the color to a much lighter tone. I guess I’ll wait for it to be completely scratched to brush it entirely
I’ve used nail varnish on a number of phones, tablets etc, and clear varnish on cracked screens. In each case there were and still are significant improvements, including tacticity and reducing grime collection.
Just to make sure: The grey part closest to the actual display (probably what you mean by “upper part of the aluminium frame”) is actually a part of the display “module”. You can see this in these photos which differ for the “grey” and the “green” display (it’s better visible in the green version): Fairphone 4 Display - Spare Part | Fairphone
If you sand or abrade the aluminium, the colour will change to ‘plain’ aluminium as you will remove the thin anodizing which gives it its appearance
If you try refinishing the whole aluminium body be careful of those inset ‘soft grips’ that will almost certainly get badly damaged.
If I were you I would maybe mask out the corners of the case and/or areas where it was damaged, smooth down with sandpaper v. carefully, with progressively finer grits, then tape off the areas into ‘nice looking’ regions and carefully paint over them in a contrasting colour. Then you will have a ‘Custom FP4’!
I wanted to take advantage of this post I made a while ago to share my latest FP4 screen’s adventures.
I finally managed to break the screen after multiple new drops. Did I say I’m clumsy AND a thick headed guy who doesn’t want to case his phone ? Yeah I did.
Bottom line, I ordered a new screen from FP official spare parts store, received it in 72h by UPS.
The replacement procedure was absolutely flawless. I mean, I knew this was supposed to be easy, but to actually do it, to replace my screen myself - clumsy as I am - in about 5min meeting no difficulty whatsoever, this alone made me so glad I stopped buying those high end unfixable devices I used to spend my salary on.
In regards to the original post, the new screen indeed comes with the greyish upper plastic part of the frame, meaning that the entire phone looks pristine except for the dented/scratched metal frame. It really does give it a “rough phone” style ! Love it.
