(preface: two logs in one day, aren't I productive)

I have now attempted to order this screen 4 times:
https://www.waveshare.com/6inch-hdmi-amoled.htm

Granted not from waveshare, you can't buy it from there (I even messaged customer support, and felt very silly the entire time about it). Spotpear, the company that waveshare works with (subcontracts? Buys parts off? Who knows) does have them listed, but will inform you they're discontinued after purchase. Aliexpress has it listed 3 more times, one with a shop that has since delisted it (it's called shop and then bunchanumbers), and then another two from smeiier (I tried purchasing once, and I got nothing). 

It's extremely annoying, because this screen almost exactly fits the dimensions of the blackberry priv's top frame, and would sit nicely underneath the curved glass, however, it was not to be (seriously though, if anyone finds one for sale that isn't discontinued, and you actually manage to get one to show up, please send details my way).

So, that leaves me with two options, both of which have huge downsides and upsides. Either I try to fit a screen between the glass and the top frame, or I design my own top frame (and glass). Both of these have pros and cons, and again, I wouldn't be posting if I hadn't already made a decision, so I'll try to keep my reasoning concise, and I'll say now, I went for designing my own top frame (STL/Blend files will be included, I had to redo the damn thing 8 times, which I guess is about the mileage I can expect when I use a clothes tape measure to try to reverse engineer professional design with low tolerances, but c'est la vie and all that).

Pro doing your own top frame:
-Blackberries are dying out. I know it's already a dead platform, but they're well past the dip into obscurity (by like 2-3 years I think), and slowly peaking upwards into collectible territory, which means they're rarer and expensiver. I'm glad I could get the priv I got (working before I got my grubby mitts on it too), not to mention the replacement parts, but I don't count on them being available in the planned life-cycle of this phone (50-70 years+). Having your own STL files available to print off new parts as and when makes things a lot easier

-Current screen availability makes choosing for the current frame a nightmare. Either I'd be picking something vastly smaller than the existing screen, or experimenting with/damaging past warranty expensive flexible screens. By doing my own flat top frame, I expand available real estate from 65mm x 138mm to 72mm x 137mm, with room to increase (I printed the bevels a bit wider than I had to). It might not sound like much, but at the dimensions we're dealing with (betwixt 5 and 6.1" diagonal screens), the extra with is what stands between a 1mm bevel, and a 1.5cm bevel, and a £50 screen or a £300 screen. 

-It's fun. This project is very much a showcase of everything I'm mediocre at, and more importantly, a chance to improve. Having never owned a 3D  printer before, going back over my blender knowledge, and doing it in a more functional way dusts the cobwebs off those braincells. For anyone having a go at their own version of this, I'd recommend you don't download the STL files, go for the blends and make your own version. Curve the edges. Adapt it to your screen 

-diy screen layering. I'm sure this will come up later as an issue I've seriously overlooked, but for now, I'm in such a great position to laugh (hubristically so) at smartphone manufacturers choosing ultra-thin glass lenses for their screens. As far as I know, capacitive touch works through about up to a centimetre, maybe slightly less. According to this, just 0.5mm more would make phones "unbreakable". I'm more than happy to go for glass a few millimetres thick (like 2-3 maybe), so we'll see how that plays out, although I've just had a quote for £60...

Pro re-using the priv's top frame:
-You don't need to do so much engineering. It is less work, the only thing you'll really need is a dremel for fitment, a ruler for checking available screen real estate, and a fresh glass. 

-preserves the look of the original. I was kinda bummed when I realised this was the path I was going down, in my humble opinion, the priv is one of the slickest phones blackberry ever designed, real swan song type stuff. I'd be lying if I said it wasn't part of the reason I even figured I would want to do this in the first place. Granted you'll have a much bigger bezel than before, but what's to stop you getting creative with additional e-ink displays, or LED arrays. 

-the original is made out of pretty sturdy aluminium. Dremmelling the top frame down was a battle for me, whereas PLA is somewhat more malleable. It's a great choice for strength if you can stomach the screen size.

-Glass isn't a challenge. After all, you've already got some tailor made for the screen. Designing my own top frame had me looking into corning/gorilla glass (£220 for the amount I'd need!!! £60 if it was more normal glass), and I believe I paid maybe 1/20th that for the 2 glass covers I got as a replacement? By going with the original, not only do you preserve the look, you preserve the ability to get OEM parts. Granted not a permanent solution, but for right now? You're pretty much golden.

Anyways, that's about your lot for pros and cons. For me, it came down to screen size (not resolution mind you). Ultimately, phones are small enough as they are for me, and I'd rather have as much screen space as I physically can, especially if I'm going to be using an experimental OS. Using steam deck in desktop mode is bad enough for me (I know you can adjust it, but it is a bit of a pain in the butt). 

A few notes for the STL/Blend, it does slide up and down without too much fuss, but it's more rickety than I'd like, and I've not yet ordered the screen (this is the one I'm thinking of going for), so I'm going to have to model cut outs for the ribbon cable and speakers when I get round to it. It's more so I could make sure I've gotten the engineering right on the back, but broad strokes, I'm very much on the home stretch with this part of the project

(Also, I've gone here for now for a perspex cover, rather than a glass one. I should be able to find a tempered glass cover for it too, so hopefully that'll give me the best of both worlds, but again, we'll see)