It boils down to it’s all software. Software sends the signals to wipe the system. Replace a few bytes in memory and that won’t happen anymore. It might write ‘Hello Bob’ on the screen instead.
Somewhere on a memory chip a ‘key’ is stored to unlock the data. If that can be accessed outside the iPhone...........................
That's not how it works, Okie. This all happens inside either the Secure Element or inside the Encryption Engine. If the passcode doesn't match for the tenth time, the one-way hash for comparison in side either one of those locations is simply erased. The system will never be able to pass the test to unlock the phone again. . . or build the 256 bit AES Key again. Without that key, it's a done deal. The only way to get at the data again is to brute force the data AES key. You are talking MORE than Cosmological time frames there.