Over the last week or so there has been some news about Apple [AAPL] buying a company out that makes Liquid metal. The metal has some unique characteristics that make it more bouncy than other metals. Rumours started going around about how a new iPhone or iPad could be made with this metal to toughen them up a little, thanks to the ability of the metal to morph a little.
We expected that in the next couple of years that this metal could be introduced somewhere in to phones although it appears that we might have already all used Liquidmetal with our iPhones and iPads and just not realised it.
The part we are talking about here is pictured above. The iPhone 3GS SIM pin is apparently made from Liquidmetal alloy. The reason this part is made of liquid metal is that it’s part of the iPhone, but not an essential part. The liquidmetal used makes the part extremely hard but at the same time very light weight.
Peker recognized the metal when he opened his iPhone 3G. It’s as hard as nails and has a distinctive color and feel.
‘That’s my metal, he said. ‘I recognized it immediately. Take it from an expert, that’s Liquidmetal.”
Normally when Apple have products built, they have a policy that the parts can be sourced from at lease two separate factories. The reasons for this is just for safety in case one factory has a problem. In the case of Liquidmetal, Apple couldn’t get two factories as Liquidmetal only has a single production line. For this reason the SIM card ejector pin was used for test purposes as it wasn’t an essential part.
It isn’t clear how many 3GS models shipped with liquidmetal pins. CultofMac also points out that the iPhone 4 doesn’t come supplied with a SIM card pin although mine did here in the UK. I just tried bending the SIM card pin I got with the iPhone 4 and it does bend although it does leave prints in my fingers. Not having another metal to compare to, I am unsure if it is liquid metal or not.
Either way, it will be interesting to see what Apple does with Liquidmetal over the coming years and if we will see more of it in products.
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