Review of NLU BodyGuardz for iPhone 3G

[netjack]

does anyone else feel that the shield doesn't provide 100% coverage? I mean the slits/folds on the back leave probably 5% of the back exposed. Why did they have to build a slit/fold design. Couldn't they have created a full form fitting shape that works w/ a convex back? Just my 2 cents.

Also, it seems because there are edges all around the phone, lots of lint/scuff is going to get caught in there. And not to mention, coming out of a pocket, any of those edges could snag and rip. No?

ps. I got all my corners lined up and to sit on my very first try and i've never applied any film like this before. I couldn't have done it without all the advice posted on here. Thanks everyone!

 

[Cross2]

Here's my fourth attempt at sticking the corners. After applying the film, I made small slits on each of the corners and used a blow dryer on and off for about 1 minute. Then I wrapped it with multiple rubberbands to hold it into place. Now I'll wait 48 hours and see what happens...

 

[xandui]

So i decided i wasnt happy with the couple of crease airbubbles i had that other people seem to be reporting as well so i sent out for a replacement set from NLU and decided to give it another try.

Well let me say that while it is very difficult it is possible to avoid those little crease bubbles in the corners that collect lint if left alone.

This isnt going to sound like the most amazing advice ever but honestly if you reapply the back and are constantly aware of keeping those creases flat they will eventually stay down as things start drying. Its easy to adjust the flaps accordingly so you wont mess anything up by prioritizing the creases and now my device looks perfect, just needs to dry.

Also i found that applying it the third time around was a breeze. All that practice really does help so if youre like me and going to give it another try dont be too daunted by the idea that its gonna be as hard as the first try was. Ill post pics once it drys a bit.

 

[pflau]

Here's my fourth attempt at sticking the corners. After applying the film, I made small slits on each of the corners and used a blow dryer on and off for about 1 minute. Then I wrapped it with multiple rubberbands to hold it into place. Now I'll wait 48 hours and see what happens...

All I can say is good luck and I hope that those rubber bands ain't going to leave impressions on the still wet still drying back.

 

[theotherrogue]

I have a crapton of bubbles on mine. Some are quite large. Will they go away or should i just try again.

Also, does anybody know the solution amounts to mix your own? I used all of mine VERY quickly...

I used about 2 oz. of water mixed with just a tiny drop of hand-soap. You need very very little soap in the mixture.

To all those having problems with bubbles: you need to use a lot of solution!! I used a very generous amount on mine and I don't have a single air bubble under mine. So, if you have any bubbles initially, they should be liquid bubbles and not air bubbles. It's very easy to smooth out liquid bubbles.

 

[xandui]

I used about 2 oz. of water mixed with just a tiny drop of hand-soap. You need very very little soap in the mixture.

To all those having problems with bubbles: you need to use a lot of solution!! I used a very generous amount on mine and I don't have a single air bubble under mine. So, if you have any bubbles initially, they should be liquid bubbles and not air bubbles. It's very easy to smooth out liquid bubbles.

While that is good advice i will say to those who finished the application process, have everything lined up exactly how they want it, but still have noticible AIR bubbles under their BG, give it a few days. I had a ton of bubbles on the back after my first try, most of them were air bubbles, and even the largest one out of them all went away with me resqueeging over it once a day after about 5 days. That was the largest one though, pretty much all the other ones were gone within 3 days.

 

[Cross2]

So rather than wait 48 hours, here are the results from 4 hours of rubberbanding immediately after applying BG. There are still a few line impressions from the rubberbands; however, they are slowly fading. I am actually quite surprised that it turned out this well. I'll post more results after a few days.

 

[uiop.]

I put my BG on about a week ago. After the 2nd or 3rd day all the bubbles were gone & the screen is clear & I'm not really noticing any probs with the touch screen. I didn't line it up the greatest so the corners look bad & all lint & stuff got stuck underneath so on a white phone it really sticks out. I still have the 2nd one & I'm a bit nervous to rip this one off, afraid it will look worse (if that's possible). It doesn't seem like it *completely* covers the chrome part & I don't think it was me because one side seems like it is good but the other has a big gap...who know, it probably was me.
Sorry for the bad pics, hope they come out, I never posted here before.

Oh wow....that looks terrible. Is there any way you can send it back?
I think I am just gonna have to go for a bulky case as I haven't heard to many good things about the BodyGuardz or InvisibleShield.

-uiop.

 

[pflau]

Well, here are some pics from my BodyGuardz experience. The first pic is a BG that I ripped off of my iPhone 3G after I noticed that I had misaligned it after it dried. After I ripped it off I did my best to stretch the skin using only my fingers. However, after I put the skin back on the backing sheet (you need to send it back if you want free replacement in the future) it basically returned to its original shape as it dried. You can tell from the picture the skin is totally flat with no sign of stretching.

To alleviate the corners’ tendency to lift, I made cut on the junctions so that the corners have more room to spread out and lay flat.

To remove the last little bit of lift, I press the little bubble against the sole plate of an iron set to Synthetic. That basically deforms the skin enough so that it stays down.

You can tell the corner is a little distorted. But it stays the hack down for good!!

BTW, that piece of plastic on the back is an egrips non-slip strip.

These are the other two corners that got the same treatment. I challenge anybody who did a better job!!

 

[TWLreal]

Wirelessly posted (Mozilla/5.0 (iPhone; U; CPU iPhone OS 2_0 like Mac OS X; en-us) AppleWebKit/525.18.1 (KHTML, like Gecko) Version/3.1.1 Mobile/5A347 Safari/525.20)

Has anyone ordered from Canada?

I'd like to know if there are duty fees involved. Shipping alone is $10. :|

 

[mavis]

I've used Invisible Shields on my iPods for years (starting with a 20GB 3rg gen iPod four or five years ago) so naturally I pre-ordered two (I always buy them in pairs, in case I mess up!) as soon as the iPhone 3G was announced. Unfortunately, after ruining both of them (botched installations on both of them - and I'm an IS veteran!) I decided to just go 'naked' as they say. Bad move. Within a few days my iPhone had numerous scratches on the back, most of them impossible to see unless you really studied it - but the Apple logo: scratched to hell and back. And I was VERY careful with it. So, I decided to order some more shields and have another go at it. After seeing this thread and checking some other online reviews, I decided to try my luck with the BodyGuardz film as it doesn't suffer from the 'orange peel' effect but is supposedly as scratch-resistant as the IS. While I waited for the BGs to arrive, I actually got my iPhone replaced and spent the last six days babying the new one - I never once set it down on a hard surface, and was EXTREMELY careful with it.

Yesterday my BG arrived. I cleaned my iPhone off and looked as hard as I could for scratches on the back - there were none, not even on the logo! So, yay. Anyway I applied the BG last night using my 'clean room' (steamy bathroom) but still managed to get tiny black fibers under the film, I guess from my microfiber work surface. Figures. But instead of just letting them be (and it bothering the heck out of me) I wet my fingers with the spray, pulled up the film (already slightly tacky at this point) and cleaned it off. I had to do this several times, but ended up with a perfectly clean install. I spent literally two hours getting the corners down perfectly but they look fantastic now, in fact they look so good that you cannot tell there's a film on there at all unless you look VERY closely. The BG is smooth, almost as smooth as a naked iPhone. It isn't as grippy/tacky as the IS but then again there's no more orange peel effect.

Below is a pic I just took (14 hours after applying the film) ... The DOF is very shallow and I tried to focus on the top corners, so the center of the iPhone's back (the Apple logo and the text at the bottom) appears to be slightly OOF. Anyway, here's the pic:

VERY HIGH RES! Click to enlarge:

After years of buying InvisibleShields for all of my electronic devices (four iPods, a DS and a PSP) and tolerating that orange peel texture, I'm happy to say the BG looks MUCH better than the IS (and at half the price, considering you get two in each pack). I won't be buying IS again, that's for damn sure.

 

[heyp]

so i've noticed that my 3 of my corners are starting to poke up a bit... i've tried rubber banding but it didn't work... any other tips for trying to get these things to stay down?

i'd re-apply but this was my second attempt and i'm out of back films

 

[cambridge1807]

so i've noticed that my 3 of my corners are starting to poke up a bit... i've tried rubber banding but it didn't work... any other tips for trying to get these things to stay down?

i'd re-apply but this was my second attempt and i'm out of back films

I've done the back application twice now, and I think I got it down...except for this one corner. I have all 3 down pretty much perfectly, except one, which lifts up a little bit. I have found that making a slit with an x-acto knife helps. You can also use nail clippers or those scissors for your nails. I find that using a hair dryer helps to get the film sticky. Just have it under in short interval so you don't risk damaging your phone. I'll add pictures in a second.

 

[cambridge1807]

Here are some pics I took. Basically to show the texture of the film on the back part and how the fitment is on the corners and bezel. The screen film is pretty much cut like every other company, so I didn't show any pics there. Well here you go, if you need more pics, I'll try to get them for you. There aren't the best of pics either...

 

[thor79]

Dunking has the benefit of cleansing the skin. A sponge can be used to soak up extra water. A sponge is lintless.

That's a good tip...never thought about that...I just had a small piece of bounty paper towel to wick away the excess water at the bottom.

Dunking it also ensures it is completely covered in the solution. The sprays leave too many gaps unless you absolutely soak it...and if you do that you will run out quick.


Also in my experience with both the BodyGuardz and BSE...they leave no residue when you take them off...you can have it looking exactly the same as when you put it on in the first place. The only exceptions to that are where dirt might have collected at the corners where it wasn't covered...but that can be wiped away.

 

[netjack]

anyone bothered by the fact that front face of the bezel (approx. 1mm metal ring) is totally exposed?

 

[jen4t25]

anyone bothered by the fact that front face of the bezel (approx. 1mm metal ring) is totally exposed?

Yeah, I emailed them about that asking if it should be completely covered (because mine isn't) & here is what they said...

"Yes you should be able to cover the chrome bezel. It will need to stretched a bit to do this. We cut it specifically about 1mm short, so it doesn't overlap the front and make it hard to install."

I don't really like the fact you have to "stretch" it, what if you stretch a little too much??

 

[netjack]

i think that is bs..there is definitely no way of that stretching that much..can anyone else confirm or deny this?

 

[pflau]

i think that is bs..there is definitely no way of that stretching that much..can anyone else confirm or deny this?

There is just no way..,

 

[JackSpearo]

cambridge, the corner near your cam looks like it will collect lint. this is what happened to mine, I have to redo it :-(

 

[iphoneheaven1]

Does anyone know if the bubbles can still disappear after 72 hours or are they just there forever? I guess I didn't do a great job because it has been about 60 hours now and I still have quite a few bubbles on the back....although they are fairly small, I was just wondering if they will still disappear?

Which skin do you have? In my case, the bubble has gone completely after 48 hours. Now, mine looks the same as a naked iphone with the skin on.

 

[pflau]

Well it's been a week since I got the BG on and even though I carry it in my pocket whenever I'm out and that my iPhone is black there is absolutely no issue with the corners getting unsightly due to lints or dirts getting trapped under the skin edges.

 

[Espo]

When applying the BG, I know the volume,mute,camera must be alligned perfectly because the skin was cut that way. However has anyone noticed that the semi-circle that is cut for the headphone jack does not line up exactly? Or it may be my mistake. Also when applying the skin to the corners, should the film overlap, or be placed with a small gap or sit very close together without a gap?

any help would be appreciated, I'm having a rough time trying to get the corners to fit without lifting. This will be my 4th try & I'm trying to just get this right.

 

[pflau]

The skin around the headphone jack must also be perfect. If not it means your skin is shifted too much toward one side or another and as a result you would either have extra skin sticking out above the bezel or the flaps at the corner would overlap.

The flaps at the corner might have a small gap or might touch each other, depending on the exact position of the skin. But they should never overlap.

 

[Espo]

To alleviate the corners’ tendency to lift, I made cut on the junctions so that the corners have more room to spread out and lay flat.

To remove the last little bit of lift, I press the little bubble against the sole plate of an iron set to Synthetic. That basically deforms the skin enough so that it stays down.

You can tell the corner is a little distorted. But it stays the hack down for good!!

BTW, that piece of plastic on the back is an egrips non-slip strip.

These are the other two corners that got the same treatment. I challenge anybody who did a better job!!

You did do a very good job, I have some questions though. You cut the junctions on all sides? Did they stay down? I can see that they may get stuck on something an lift accidently.

Also I don't understand what you did with the plate to synthetic? Can you be please elaborate?

Also you say the strip on the back is an egrip? Meaning you didn't use bodyguardz? Thanks for the help, I would really like for my bg to turn out like yours, or without bubbles and creases at all.