Samsung’s new Galaxy S8 and Galaxy S8+ flagships are insanely beautiful just as they are in the box, but YouTuber JerryRigEverything thought that the Galaxy S8 may look a bit better with a transparent back panel, and has made a video to show the internet how to achieve it. The Galaxy S8 is not an easy phone to tear down, but this procedure is still fairly simple; you just take the back off, get the paint off to make it clear, clean it up, optionally take out or cut some internal components as you prefer to provide a better look at the internals, then put the clear back on the phone with good adhesive. Once you do this, the phone will no longer be water-resistant, and you’ll void your warranty.
You’ll need a few things to try this. The most important supply is a heat gun. You’ll also need a thin prying tool, clear double-sided adhesive strips, and some kind of solvent or paint and epoxy remover. Use the heat gun to carefully heat up the back of the phone around the edges until the back cover can be loosened, then pry it off. The fingerprint scanner and camera assembly will come along for the ride, and you’ll need to pry those off very carefully. Once you’ve got just the glass in your hands, give it a good bath in that solvent, then scrape or peel off the paint and epoxy, along with the laminated layer underneath. Once you’ve done that, use the clear adhesive to put the camera and fingerprint scanner back on.
The easiest touch to add some flair would be to put a custom design of some sort under there; anything you can get out of your printer can be your phone’s new look, if that’s what you’re after. If you want to go for a fully clear aesthetic, though, you may still want to modify the phone’s innards for looks. The wireless charging pad is huge and blocks most of the view, but is easy to remove. Obviously, the phone will no longer charge wirelessly if you do that. As a PSA, don’t try to separate the coils from the black plastic that they’re in; taking them out can cause shorting, which can be especially dangerous because the coil sits on your battery. JerryRigEverything also cut away a bit of the loudspeaker assembly down below to expose the 3.5mm jack and half of the charging port that was hidden. Once you have the inside of the phone looking how you want it, lay that double-sided adhesive down along the edges, cut it carefully to fit, then press the glass on. For extra bonding and to possibly get back some water protection, you can heat the adhesive a bit if you wish, both along the edges and at the camera and fingerprint sensor. Be mindful of possible heat damage, of course.