JerryRigEverything recently came out with a video which was kind of misleading, where he identifies the outer coating of the LG G5 as ‘plastic’. However, other major sites picked it up quickly, and corrected the claim made by Jerry conforming that it was a coat of primer, on an aluminum chassis. It’s not his fault either; distinguishing between Primer and Plastic is tough. So can it still be called an ‘all metal’ phone? Let the debate begin…
What LG had to say about this:
With the video going off, people over at Android Authority contacted LG and got back some details regarding this issue which I will include below this paragraph. After a day of uploading the video, LG’s global communications director, Ken Hong, left this comment on the video. Three days later, LG also posted an official statement about the G5 materials on their blog. You may read it here.
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What you’re seeing in that video is primer, not plastic. The primer is required to get the paint to bond to the aluminum body. The aluminum alloy we sourced is known as LM201b (patent pending) and was developed at the Korea Institute of Industrial Technology for use in automobiles and aircraft.
LM201b, unlike the aluminum used in competing smartphones, is diecast unibody, not sheet aluminium. We chose LM201b because it’s very sturdy and lightweight. The weight characteristic was important because unlike other aluminum phones, ours has the modular design so the case needed to be extra strong. Trying to achieve this level of structural strength with traditional aluminum would have resulted in heavy phone.
The insulated antenna is embedded in the aluminum and coated in primer, paint and clearcoat [which] allows the signal to still get through. And it’s not just any old paint but a much more durable type with microscopic metal particles that is applied using a process called “microdizing” to bond it to the aluminum.
I think it’s incorrect to say that a product isn’t all metal if paint is involved. That’s like saying cars and airplanes aren’t metal because they’re also painted. For the record, even metal that’s anodized will scratch off. Our process may be different but it achieved what we were aiming for, which is a smooth, seamless metal finish that’s durable and lightweight.
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What LG advertises the G5 as
While some people are going crazy over this issue and accusing LG for not living up to the claims, let’s actually go over some of the sentences and phrases that they used during their press release to describe the G5 in terms of its body.
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- “…a brand new design with… a sleek, metal uni-body”
- “Encased in a sleek metal aluminum body”
- “…a smooth colorful metal surface through an advanced microdizing process which takes anodized aluminum to a whole new level”
- “…the insulative antenna is invisibly integrated into the body without disrupting the seamless look of the metal uni-body”
- “LG designers took the metal body concept one step further”, “…in a full metal uni-body design”
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Here, they’ve mentioned phrases like ‘metal uni-body’ and ‘full metal body’ once or twice throughout the press release. While there is absolutely no denying that the back plate is made out of metal (Aluminium), we generally consider a phone to have a ‘metal body’ if the surface that you feel on your hand is metal, not the metal that is used under a layer of primer coating. Well, the explanation we provided in the aforementioned sentence doesn’t quite go well with the bullet points before that. Saying “a colorful metal surface” and “the seamless look of the metal uni-body” absolutely makes it sound like the external surface that you see and feel is metal, not that the metal uni-body exists somewhere underneath a layer of primer and paint. I don’t think it should be made such a big deal as I believe LG is not deliberately misleading people, rather, they aren’t even misleading us, in my opinion; its just the way they think of a ‘metal body’ that’s different.
So what now?
Again, when you take a moment and think about it, both sides are on an equilibrium, they are equally correct. While it is technically true that the LG G5 is all metal with that Aluminium rare side and the added primer on top of it, not being able to actually feel and appreciate the metal makes me also think otherwise. So its up to you to figure out what you think about this and whether you feel like LG has mislead you or not.
To tie this up, the LG G5 is made up of a plastic body. It has a solid metal back with a significantly thick layer of primer, which by the way does contains traces of Aluminium. What LG posted three days ago still didn’t exactly answer the questions or cover the doubts we had and they have promised to generate something soon, “to give more insight into the manufacturing process,” but until then, it’s crystal clear that the LG G5 is made of metal, just not exactly in the way most people thought it was.
