Apple sent me a 79-pound iPhone repair kit to repair a 1.1-ounce battery

Apple may be joking.

I felt the same way over and over again when I jumped out of the hoop after the ridiculous hoop to replace the battery in my iPhone mini. Part of it was the repair process – for the most part, how difficult it was for Apple to get there.

Last month, Apple launched its self-service repair program, allowing US customers to repair broken screens, batteries and cameras on the latest iPhones for the first time using Apple’s own parts and tools. I couldn’t wait. I’ve never repaired a phone successfully – and my wife never let me live when I broke her Samsung Galaxy while using a hair dryer to change the screen. At this point, armed with an official repair manual and genuine parts, I’ll make it right.

Apple will let me buy that part, read its manual less and rent its equipment, a big change for the company. For years, Apple has been lobbying to suppress right-to-repair policies across the country, accusing the company of doing everything possible to prevent customers from repairing their own phones. It’s easy to see this as a big moment for DIY lawyers. But after going through the repair process, I can’t actually recommend it – and I have a secret suspicion that Apple likes it that way.

One thing you need to understand about Apple’s home repair process is that it is far from DIY. I was expecting Apple to send me a small box of screw drivers, spiders and pliers; Finally I have a mini iPhone. Instead, I found two giant pelican cases – 79 pound tools – on my front porch. I can’t believe how big and heavy Apple thought it was to send them both ways.

I took the case on a BART train to San Francisco and dragged them down the street to our office. Then, I put everything on the table and started.

The first step in opening the iPhone is, basically, using a heavy machine to absorb the screen at the top. Here, I wasn’t doing a jelly-filled soak microwave to loosen the Apple Gup held down my screen. Apple lets you rent an industrial-quality heat station that looks like a piece of lab equipment, up to a big red safety dial twisted to release the emergency-off button and suction-cup-tipped mechanical lifting arm.

I slide my phone into a well-sized “heating pocket” that binds a copper ring around the iPhone’s band so that the heat is evenly distributed and the seal around the screen melts, I’m afraid I’ve invited “hot pockets”! Jingle to stay hired in my head, then rotate the dial to raise the hand that separates the screen of the iPhone from his body.

Or, anyway, how it works. On my first try, the heating machine dropped an error code and Apple’s manual did not specify what to do if your phone gets stuck inside. So I heated it twice in a row. And yet, when the suction cup started to lift the glass by hand, it wasn’t enough to pop up my screen “immediately”. The manual covered the situation, causing me to rotate another hidden knob to put more pressure on the suction cup, but when I looked like a cracked spider on the screen, I started to panic. (It turned out to be just a suction cup residue.)