Case Mod Cosmos 1000 Flash mod

[tkgclimb]

Hello everybody

Okay, so I've been wanting to do something like this for a while and I finally started. This is my first case mod of any sort, but I have worked with metal and stuff before, just not on anything like this. The theme for the mod is The Flash like Flash Gordon flash, I like the colors (they match my room) I like the character, and there are some other reasons for picking it also. It will be done almost purely with a B&D rotary tool and a dewalt drill. I might go to the metal shop (where I happen to work) and get some parts cnc'ed. I laugh at myself for having access to a whole shop, yet doing this with limited tools at my house. well I can jump on this whenever i like then because it's here, and when I'm there I work. enough of my rant

I really like the cosmos 1000, it has good aesthetics outside and in, that is why I bought it in the first place. Now i'm going to mod it, but I will try to keep the features I like about the case (ie the door and the hdd bays). any thoughts are welcomed

Onto the pictures (sorry there's not more but you really don't need to see me cutting)



The flash symbol is going to go here on the side panel, I will put a clear piece of acrylic on, and then A yellow lighting bolt on top, (the first time/ rotary tool job edged will be covered with u-channel molding. But I kinda like the hand done/original look.)



The bolt

On the front side of the case, behind the door I will showcase a hdd, maybe an ssd once I get the money



The plastic that covers the front

IT will get cleaned up and painted red, and the mesh grill that comes over it (but doesn't do anything) will get painted yellow. The hd will get mounted in red acrylic.


on to the top. I cut out an extra fan hole, but had to shift the original one over to fit it in. Leaving me with a mounting problem. I made a bracket (man did it eat up my cutting wheels)



Here is the custom braket, which didn't turn out good at all since I kept having to move mounting holes and it's made out of thin metal, maybe one of the parts I cnc' latter.


The plastic cover that goes over the top exhaust fans


Will get painted red, and an aluminum mesh that goes in the hole will get painted yellow.

The other side panel


I'm thinking a red flash on there and then somehow do a rough circle around it (no edges just spray paint) and then having the rest of the panel red. The windowed panel will also be red. the plastic border's of the case will be yellow, and the handles/feet will be red.

Any thoughts, comments, questions.

wish me luck

[tkgclimb]

Thanks Guy's

Yeah I'm working on those edges, it's hard to get crisp clean cuts using just a rotary tool, especially when I'm pretty new with it.

Hey shadow, I took your advice and came here, I will do the TH one to though, and I made sure to put your name in the "who referred you" box.

More stuff tomorrow

[tkgclimb]

Good and good/bad news

Some good news, got some more stuff cut out, i think all of it

the mesh grill in the top

I think it turned out pretty good. Had to create notches in the underside of the plastic for it too fit but it fit's great and will be epoxied in once i'm done painting

Just A hint at what the hdd showcase will look like


and my bottom fans , there is mesh epoxied on to add more ventilation to the psu.

One thing I learned doing this bottom part is it is hard to get good fan holes cut out, trying to use the fan itself as the stencil. So a one fan is only screwed in by 2 or three screws. Granted part of the problem was the hdd rack which made it impossible to drill well. I need to get some wire fan grills, and use those. I have some paper stencils that I printed out but there just to flimsy to be accurate on hole placements. ohh well At least it isn't too visible and i'll learn from this mistake.

Ok now the good/bad news, the weather here is not so great depending on how you look at it, it just snowed 10 inches and more is on the way, which is not helpful for painting especially when that will be done in a garage with an open door or outside. But i get to go skiing on some sick snow

[tkgclimb]

Okay I've got some opinion questions, which paint scheme do you think will look best on the non-window side panel
option 1


note: the circle will be round or ovular not weird, and the guy will be the flash character, but with no detail just a silhouette
option 2


Now out of those two schemes their are more options, the circle edges can be rough and just hand spray painted, or I can use an edge and make them fine. Also For the guy I can, glue/tape this painted red instead of just having a silhouette. Remember the lightning bold on the other side panel will stick out a little also, so I thought it would be nice to have a little match??.

Anyway what do you think.

[tkgclimb]

Thanks for the advice, I have made sure to keep sanding and filing to get nice edges, but some stuff (ie those bad cuts in the case) I just can't redo with my budget.

Do you guys think I should use the metal flash cut out, or just to a silhouette painted onto the side panel?

[tkgclimb]

Thanks for the support everybody,

And the accent is a great idea, I'll do a yellow accent since I have some yellow left over from the lightning bold, the guy will be red so it will look better, the only problem is that I'll have to do two parts and mesh them. But since I can mesh them on the straight factory edge it shouldn't be a problem.

I think I'll also cut out a flash out of the side panel, so the acrylic can go behind the side panel to accent the metal cutout. If I do this I can light it and it will look sick, and this way the the guy won't stick out too far.
it will hopefully look like


in case your wondering the picture I'm kinda trying to emulate is


To bad I'm not a talented enough artist to do the small individual lightning bolts

In the meantime, I just got a snow day, so I don't have to go to school on Friday because of


And there is more to come. And now that I have more cutting to do, I don't have to paint, yet.

Thanks again guys

[tkgclimb]

Thanks for the feedback everyone.

So since I'm going to do this lit acrylic background how does painting the whole panel red sound (instead of leaving a circle in the middle so you could see the guy) it might end up looking like this.

paint number 3

[tkgclimb]

You Figured me out, oh no

any way thanks for the opinions and support guys

Here's the panel cutting process. The guy is bigger in actuality than in the pictures so the red might not be too overwhelming, in option 3.

With option two I can't do the lighted acrylic accent as well, because yellow would blend in with the circle and red with the guy.

Option 3 might be the best just because during the cutting and sanding process I scratched the panel a tad, (it's just hard to cut so detailed with a rotary tool in this thick of metal)





The edges are cleaned up in that picture, but there is some tape residue left over on the sides which makes it look bad. You can see those surface scratches I was talking about on lookers left ear and right hand.

Next cutting out the backing acrylic and then onto painting.

[tkgclimb]

Originally Posted by stonedsurd

Dude, you shouldn't have cut out the bit between Flash's left arm and his torso. Now he looks sort of fat

No it's okay the metal cut out will go in the space and then be backed my yellow lighted acrylic, should look something like



if I paint it all red, but you get the general idea.

[tkgclimb]

If I did option 3 and went all red, how would you feel about some cheesy lightning bolts to yellow it up, I can't do much better with my drawing and painting skills.


they look pretty cheesy, maybe I'll see if I can get anyone to draw and tape some better ones on for me.

I think I'm going to have to paint the whole thing read to cover up the blemishes, which happend because I made a stupid mistake, I should of cut from the backside so the front would look clean (because now the back looks clean) , it was just a stupid mistake, and I'm kicking myself right now.

[tkgclimb]

I have sanded the edges down, next I'm going to get some 1500 grit and or use the wire wheel for my rotary tool and see what I can do.

The only problem is that no matter how smooth and pretty I make it look, the edges will be different from the brushed aluminum around it.

Man I wish I hadn't made that mistake. rrrrrrrrrrr, stupid, stupid.

What about enclosing the guy in red and leaving the edges bare?

[tkgclimb]

Something like this maybe, I could also do with sharp edges, a different shape, and make it a lot rougher, maybe even like just a rough spray over just like covering the thing, that might look kinda cool.

I'll see if I can get the lighting bolts drawn though because that would be my number one way. It might be difficult to tape them on accurately and nicely/

[tkgclimb]

^stencil is an excellent idea

I have some artist friends over here who all talk to first and see if they can't draw it out on some card stock and then cut it out, to make a stencil.

Maybe I'm asking to much here, but maybe I'll cut out the bolts (or just some of them) and put lighted acrylic behind them too. (cutting from the back this time!!!) But they might be really hard to cut out well, since they are so small, could always do the general shape and then work it with sandpaper and mini files.

I'll probably have to get some more acrylic to do that though.

I'm definently not going to do the red circle clear edges idea, I just don't like it.

[tkgclimb]

Sorry I havn'te posted in a while, weather and school been holding me up, heres whats up so far.


painting, this piece turne out good


Still, pretty good, It's wet now, but I had some uneven painting, so I had to sand/scrape it off and then paint it again, but you can still see some uneven ridges from the old paint job, once it dries I'll go over it again.


Lighting bolt stencils, I cut them out myself


Paints I'm using, The dupoint self etching primer is for the Aluminum, I need some more plastic specialty, they don't make yellow so I'll have to paint with the plastic stuff first or just try the primer.

[tkgclimb]

More painting today,

The Mesh grill for the front

The front side panel

The self etching primer has this wierd texture/sand thing to it, I don't know why, at first I didn't like it, but after going over it with red, I like it.

other side panel


Guy


And putting the window and bolt together, THe clear is attached by mounting tape, and the bolt is epoxied on the very edges. This picture is upside down sorry.


I don't know when I'll be able to finish painting, but it will be ASAP, my mom wants her garage back.

[tkgclimb]

Looking good! Btw, make sure you put on a clear coat on the case once done AND on the Acrylic. It helps the acrylic from getting scratched.

Thanks
I've never heard of clear coat on acrylic, but it makes sense, I'll be picking some up soon.

I have to say I am a big fan of the "do it with my own hands" approach. You've done a good job so far. Looking forward to how the lighting appears.

Thanks, Yeah when I went to paint the lightning on sunday it got windy which is bad for stencils and paint. But i'm looking forward to how it turns out.

Edit: Just saw you said lighting, that should be in on thursday, well some of it, I couldn't find any yellow (well some amber at frozen cpu, but I ordered from newegg beause I had to get a wireless adapter also), so the back panel lighting will have to wait.

[tkgclimb]

Very nice case mod so far

Thanks man,

I can just spray the clear coat over everything right, (including the windowed panels), I should clear coats the plastics too right?

[tkgclimb]

But i can just clear coat over the panel, I don't have to remove the window right? I can it's no big deal, but I can't remove the bolt. if I like the clear coat I'll do the panels because they get moved a a lot, but some of the other stuff maybe not.

[tkgclimb]

Thats what I thought, Thanks for the help. I'll get some clear coat and get back to paingint as soon as I can

[tkgclimb]

Ha! I meant "lightning" but apparently my fingers went and got quick on me again. The lighting will be good too, I'm sure. Another site you could try for parts, although I haven't bought anything from them as of yet, is http://www.performance-pcs.com. They sometimes have what frozencpu does not.

You get buried in snow last week down there or what? One report I read said Wolf Creek got 67".

Thanks, I found some yellow lighting at performance pc's, thats a big help, a little pricey but I think this will work.
http://www.performance-pcs.com/catal...ducts_id=27096
I might need two of them to make it even though which will get expensive. Here are some other suggestions, could I had this http://www.performance-pcs.com/catal...roducts_id=514 bulb to this kit http://www.newegg.com/Product/Produc...-005-_-Product or would it not work.

I coult always get the yellow bulb with a seperate inverter and all, or get one more powerfull set, what do you think?

we did get buried in snow last week, four feet in town (Durango).

Just a thought, any chance of mounting a small plasma globe/crackle tube some where in the case (thinking between the external drive bays) ? Or perhaps behind Flash?
See: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plasma_globe
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crackle_tube

Would look pretty cool, esp if you can find a red/yellow one.

That would a cool alternative to the flash lighting or in the drive bays, The only problem is I'm having a hard time finding one that would fir at a resonable price, in fact I'm hacing a problem finding some at all. I assume i would have to use a battery powered one (or at leas that would be the easiest).

I wonder what the power draw is, because the way those things work they relay on high voltage (but again so do CC's). If you found one please let me know.

Thanks for all the ideas, input, and help guys.

Edit: I found some at target and walmart, but their the standard purlple sphere's. I've also found some luminglas (the flat crackle tube things) but they are expensive http://www.amazon.com/Luminglas-Illu...5154269&sr=8-6

I havn't found any yellow/red/orange plasma globes for sale though, i also wonder how they would react in the external drive bays touching all the metal and other parts. I think a luminglas behind the flash would be the best use, or maybe one on the bays.