Scratch Build – In Progress Project: Der_Meister - custom alu case *Epilogue Nov 8th, 2007*

HOly Crap Man!! I just found this project and I like your work and ideas a lot. Very clean, accurate, and well planned out with lots of creativity too!
I'm definately subscribing to this project, this is very nice work jokkos!!!

 

Love the mod. What CPU block are you going to be using?

 

Looking great! I love the way you are taking your time, making sure everything is done properly, rather than rushing the job so you can admire/use it.

Keep up the good work!

 

it's a Superflower PSU, this one (sorry the description is in German):
link

 

I'm using the Aqua-Computer Cuplex XT block for PIV (link )

 

Hey guys, I’ve not been posting a lot this week, sorry, busy at work.

I’ve started work on the bottom front section of the case, which I will call the ‘bottom panel’. It’s actually the interface with the outside (buttons, switches, aquaero) as well as a very important section on the inside (it covers up the pump and there will be a lot of wiring action going on).

Here are a few sketches. These are 95% final. Only thing that is not done on them is the stuff for the wiring. I’m planning to do that soon.

First of view from the outside of the case:

The panel with switches etc will be somewhat recessed.

And this is a rear side view of what it will look like:


As you can see, there will be a lot of work needed on this. I will have to make a lot of small plates, corner pieces etc in order to assemble the whole lot together. Mounting will go in two ways: some pieces will be glued together (JB Weld) and in some places I’ll use bolts.
It probably sounds complicated, and well…it is.

Since I don’t have a lot of time atm, just a couple of pics.
I started by making the piece for the switches etc and the side supports of the construction. Here they are:


I bought an alu front for the Aquaero. Here it is together with the pieces, you can get a feel of how it’s going to end up:


I’m not going to use that alu front though (or at least, not directly). I didn’t realize when I ordered it that it has white printing on it and I just don’t like the look of that. Furthermore it’s brushed. I’m not really going for a mirrorfinish on my whole case, but also not for a look that is as brushed as this front. When I sand it, I’ll destroy the white printing. Anyway, you’ll see what I’m going to do with it soon.

I also cut the cornerpieces and side pieces for the front of the assembly of the bottom panel. I’ve bought two corner bars for this: 15x15mm (1,5mm thick) and 10x20mm (2mm thick). In this pic most of the stuff is cut, only a few pieces left.


See you soon with some more pics and progress!

 

The Rammstein logo window almost made me wet my pants.

Good work!

 

I’ve continued work on the bottom panel. All the pieces for the assembly of the front part are done. Before I’m starting with the JB Weld, I’m going to sand the pieces a bit. When everything’s glued together, it’s all harder to access. So everything I can do now, is easier.

I also drilled the holes to attach the bottom panel to the front panel of the case.

Here’s a pic of all the bits and pieces. You can the holes in two of them:


A close-up of these pieces. The holes are threaded to fit M4 bolts.


And here is the front panel of the case.


Now, what I didn’t really took into consideration is that I only have five holes. That is, I knew that in advance, and the bottom panel has ‘no’ left side corner bit. You’ll see what I mean soon. There isn’t enough room to the left of the panel you see, the bar of the case frame is awfully close.

But of course, this means that I also only have 5 holes in the front panel. While sketching, I thought ‘I’ll just drill the sixth one, thread it and put a short bolt in’. However, as you can see in the last pic, the hole (the +-sign in case you’re only reading this quickly) would be very close to the edge of the panel. I think it would look completely wrong if I drill it and put a bolt there. It wouldn’t be in line with the M5 bolts on the edge of the panel, most especially since one of them is so nearby.

What do you think? Leave it as it is and not drill it? There is going to be another mod to the right of the bottom panel, maybe I can ‘disguise’ the bolt on the right side so it looks as it’s part of the other mod (logo panel). I think I’m going to wait at least until I do the other project, maybe it will work out like that.

See you after the week-end, which will be busy busy for me.

 

I've had a great time reading this thread and watching the mod unfold, very nice design and craftsmanship throughout. Its actually made me less afraid of the aluminum part of my new case since you're doing such a good job with yours, keep up the great work.

 

One of the coolest DIY-cases out there atm I really like the framestructure and all the details! I think I'll have to copy some of them

 

Okay, continuing on the bottom panel! I’ve got a nice update for you…

I drilled out the holes for mounting the Aquaero in the side pieces. To my surprise they were spot on from the first time!


By the way, you may be wondering why the side pieces are different. Well, the left one is there with the sole purpose of adding some support and holding the left side of the Aquaero. The right one is another story, there will be lots of cables running to and from this side (power cables, some cables coming from the Aquaero, etc etc). By leading most of them through the hole I cut, it’s easier to keep them together.

Next thing I did was prepare my usb-ports. I needed the cover to mark the cuts I need to make on the front piece of the bottom panel (three holes for bolts and two for the usb-ports). For this mod, I use a 4-port PCI bracket:


First step was to resize the PCI slot cover, I cut off both ends. For this I used the dremel with a reinforced cutting disc. After a bit of filing, this is the result:


Very handy: those holes and the threads for the bolts are suited for M3 bolts. So I can use my hex head bolts for this without having to rethread or anything. Sweet.

Okay, at that point I realized how ugly the PCI slot cover looks. Since my panels will become smooth one day, I needed it to look smooth as well. So I started sanding it. It took a long time for such a small piece, obviously because it’s made from steel and not alu. Lots of sweating, sanding fingers and nails, and cursing later, it is pretty smooth:


I’m quite pleased, when I saw this result I was glad I took the time for it. It needs a finishing touch later when I finish up the whole bottom panel.

Then it was time for something which I was a bit afraid of, but turned out to be quite easy. You guys helped me with the lay-out of my switch and button panel a while ago. Well, here we go!

First of all, marking everything that needs to be drilled and/or cut:


The two columns of round holes on the sides are drilled. The two on the bottom are for my chrome LED holders, I didn’t have them when I made the holes. So I didn’t finish those holes.


I continued with the openings for the usb-ports. Drilling, cutting, filing, you know how it works. Here it is installed (hex head bolts coming later):


And one from the back. Now you understand why I needed the usb-ports to be near the bottom of the panel while I was showing you all the different lay-outs I made, right?


Then came the ‘difficult’ part. The round holes for the vandal buttons needed to be 19mm diameter. I don’t own a drill that comes close to that. So I drilled 5mm holes next to one another until I could push the middle part through. Then I used the dremel with a high-speed cutter to cut away most of the excess material. This was very easy, I didn’t think it would perform so well with the 2mm alu. After the dremel action, I filed and sanded the holes until the button could be put in. And I was left with this:


So, I wanted to see this one on the bare alu panel, and not on the tape. I removed it, then I sanded the panel. It’s not the final sanding, but I wanted it be look smooth already. I attached all the buttons and switches and the usb-ports. And…well, thanks guys for helping me choose such a sweet lay-out!
(the vandals are not perfectly aligned, that is because they all have a bit of room to move; this is of course just a test so I didn’t bother):


And another. Sorry for the blurriness, my cam doesn’t like all the shiny stuff so much:


The backside wanted to be shown as well. Everything is accessible, good lay-out:


Of course, the day after I took these pics, the chrome led holders arrived, together with the leds I bought for them. I’m using frosted white leds, they only output 3000MCD which is perfect: I’ll see when the drives are working without having to wear sunglasses, heh.

I completed the holes for the led holders and testfitted them. Again my camera didn’t like the shinyness. But they look perfect.


That’s it for this time. Next update will be about sanding and glueing!

 

go right ahead

 

Update!

After making all the bits and pieces, the time almost came to start assembling the bottom panel. ‘Almost’, because I first sanded all the parts to 600 grit. The final sanding will come later on. This way, if I can’t reach everything, it’s no big deal.

Because there was a lot of sanding and it’s boring, I started on the parts for the part of the bottom panel that will be inside the case. I needed some corner-pieces:


I also made one of the vertical pieces. I don’t think it’s visible in the sketches I posted. It will become clear soon though. This piece goes on the side. I bended it with clamps, vice and hammering. It’s 2mm, the bend looks good. I needed to bend it because there’s going to be a hole in it, pretty close to the bend. So I couldn’t make two parts and a corner piece and glue it all together.


Anyway, here’s a pic of all the pieces that will make up the front of the bottom panel. This pic is taken right after I washed them to get all the dust and dirt off.


And another. Everything is pretty smooth. The corner profiles had a different color than the main pieces before I sanded them. Now they all look pretty much the same.


Before glueing, I sanded the areas on the pieces where the glue would be applied with a rough, 120 grit, sanding paper. This gives a much stronger bond cause the glue has more ‘grip’.

It took 3 steps to glue this whole thing together. First was to attach side pieces to the switch/button piece…


…and to the side parts of the bottom panel:


Once this was all dry, I did a test fitting. It wasn’t good, it was pretty darn perfect. WOOHOO!
Here you see the main parts with the Aquaero in, from the backside. Looking good…


And the frontside.


I like the stainless steel frontplate of the Aquaero so much better than the alu one. The black printing is so much better than the white on the alu frontplate. Even though you can’t really see it in these pics. There is one ‘problem’ with the Aquaero though, the three pushbutton switches are very movable, a bit loose actually. They work properly but it feels ‘cheap’.

Here are the two faceplates. The alu one would fit in more with the case, but I like the stainless steel one better.


These two observations made me think. I did some measuring, and yep…the buttons stick out by 2mm. Hmmm, and I have an alu faceplate I’m not going to use, that is 2mm thick…
So I disassembled the stainless steel cover, put the alu one behind it and put the whole thing together. Result: the pushbuttons are not loose anymore and are flush with the surface! I think this looks much better than the stock Aquaero, even though in this pic there’s one bolt missing, heh.


Okay, back to the glueing. Phase two: attaching more corner pieces. Late in the evening with bad lighting!


And finally, phase three: putting it all together:


To finish this post: here’s the result. Everything’s exactly where I needed it to be. In short, a great result.


Next post: does it attach to the case as well as it came together, and first pics of the work on the rest of the bottom panel.

 

Small update for the week-end, which again will be very busy for me!

Okay, time to fit the bottom panel in the case! One slight setback: when I removed the clamps from the last glueing operation, there was some Jbweld that had escaped to the front of the panel. Unfortunately. I attacked it as best as possible with a file, but I can’t get it all off. It’s not a big deal though, because of the sticker I’ll make for the button/switch panel. But this explains the scratches etc you’ll see in the next few pics. I did sand it softer by now, but I have no pics of this.

The good news: the panel fitted almost perfectly to the holes I drilled during assembly! Here it is (on the left the biggest of the aformentioned scratches):


The fit is really superb. Better than I ever dared to imagine! This is the left side:


And this is the bottom side. The left corner (on the right is this pic) has the only small gap of the whole panel. But it’s only small, so in all I’m very happy with the fit!


Here’s one of the inside. It’s all good.


With the Aquaero in. The bit that covers the underside of its front part (which is 0,5mm alu) needs to be filed down a bit.


During all the dry time of the glue I have been sanding the plexi part I made for my optical bay (previous project). Since it was ready to be wetsanded and polished and I needed a break from the bottom panel, I spent some time on it. Here are a few pics:

Sanded, before wetsanding:


After wetsanding, before polishing. This pic and the following one clearly show why it can be beneficial to leave plexi sanded in some circumstances (for lighting): note the edges on this one, they are all glowing very uniformly.


And now take a look at the edges again. This is after polishing. The uniform glow is gone, where there’s more plexi it is deeper and where there’s less plexi it is fainter. This is best seen on the bottom edge under the dvd slot opening. Imagine how different it would look when some UV light is put nearby.


That’s it, see you after the week-end. Next update will show the construction of the back portion of the bottom panel assembly.

 

Looks good

 

Looks really nice Like those buttons, and the idea with the setup is just great.

Love your work^^

 

I've just read through all of this - it's a fantastic piece of work. Keep it up!

 

i really like this mod do we have any updates yet

 

what application were you using for the CAD drawings?

 

I don't use any CAD software, the software that I use for the 3d sketches is SketchUp (www.sketchup.com)