One word: "Plastics"

-a quote from the movie "The Graduate....Anyway...I was thinking about all the different types of plastics out there and how some of them are extremely durable -like the kind of plastic they used to make telephones from back in the 70's. That stuff never broke. Also, that blue plastic they make water bottles from.....almost indestructible.


So....WHY then is it when I drop my phone, that type of plastic cracks and/or breaks like it's made from eggshell?

If you dropped an old rotary phone the plastic would crack. Thickness and size. Although I always have that movie, "the man in the white coat," in the back of my mind I also know that Apple spent millions on self repairing glass so I don't think it's that kind of situation.

Plastic can be a thing of glory and power.

Bakelite was the plastic old phones were made of. It also was the very first plastic invented, ca 1905. It was good stuff, but newer plastics are superior. As @DaFreak said it's toughness was related to size and thickness. Also it had to have a matrix within, asbestos in the old days. When I was around 7-8 I had a fishing reel housed in bakelite,my uncle took a few of us fishing and I hooked into a fairly big halibut, almost got it to the boat after 20 min and the damned reel literally exploded. Now days bakelite is in the form of micarta