When 43 million people have seen something with their own eyes — say, Canadian videographer Lewis Hilsenteger bending an iPhone 6 Plus with his bare hands — it leaves a powerful impression that’s not easy to rebut.
Apple did its best on Thursday (see Apple Rebuts Complaints of Bending iPhones).
Consumer Reports did better, putting six smarthphones under an Instron compression test machine and measuring the results.
“So what’s the bottom line for BendGate?” asks electronics editor Glenn Derene in the attached video. “Well, based on our comparative tests here at Consumer Reports, while not the strongest phones on the market, fears of a serious design flaw on the iPhone 6 and 6 Plus seem overblown.”
Best part: Where, for comparison purposes, Derene tries — and fails — to generate the 80-lbs. force needed to break four pencils at once (2:15).
[youtube=http://youtu.be/Y0-3fIs2jQs]
See also: Singing the BendGate blues
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Follow Philip Elmer-DeWitt on Twitter at @philiped. Read his Apple (AAPL) coverage at fortune.com/ped or subscribe via his RSS feed.
