Watch These Hackjob Mechanics Replace a Toyota SUV’s Brake Pads With iPhones
“On second thought, let’s not go to Russia, ’tis a silly place.”
Russia is a land of vodka, jet fighter-powered BMWs, and apparently, brake pads made out of iPhones.
This bad idea comes to you courtesy of Russian YouTube channel Garage 54, which is known for vehicle mods that'd make any redneck American proud. Think rubber chicken exhausts, tires filled with concrete, and other experiments of an equally hazardous, but even more amusing nature. It was only a matter of time before they started playing with questionable brake mods, and they decided there was no better way to compromise a car's most critical safety system than by jamming SEO-friendly iPhones into a Toyota SUV's brakes.
They popped the wheels off the Toyota, partially disassembled the brakes, and wedged the pads back in to ensure that pressure on the iPhones was as evenly distributed as possible. They then reassembled the brakes, locked the axles, and gave their new, horrible brake job a test, shearing the screen off at least one phone in the process. Destruction for everyone's amusement being the point, they bolted the wheels on, and commenced brake tests inside their shop.
Surprisingly, an iPhone holds up to the frictional forces of a few panic stops, though obviously, it's not as much the abrasion as it is the pressure that busts the phones. When the mechanics of Garage 54 pried the phones back out, they found them totally inoperable, their cases and interiors destroyed.
What did we learn from this exercise? Aside from the fact that you can kinda use an iPhone as a makeshift brake pad, a whole lotta nothing. They didn't grind the phones down enough to puncture their lithium-ion batteries, which would make for a real show, but also be pretty dangerous. Just ask Tesla about the risks of a flaming lithium-ion battery.