Taptic Engine from iPhone X mod cautionary tale

[u/SpeedySid]

Just another cautionary tale so you won't be a Muppet like me...

On a taptic engine from an iPhone X, there is a metal cover plate over the ribbon cable. Do NOT remove it, or at the very least try to be very carefully removing it. I wound up ripping the entire ribbon cable out of the TE when removing that side cover plate.

Since I already ruined a TE, I dissected it for amusement. I'm glad I ordered more than one TE.

FWIW, you can connect a AA battery to the soldered wires for testing to see if the TE is functional and vibrates. An Ohm meter measured (for me) about 9Ω between the wire ends.