Scratch Build – In Progress Epic PC's Carbide Series is now the Lamptron Vector Series! 12.8.2011

Indeed, I cannot remember just how many times I have seen it.


Time for an update then. The case is taking shape as just the second sheet goes under the CNC. Due to the wide range of parts going into the case, once again I was able to fill the entire sheet


First up was the front plate, after a good polish it looks like this.



See those horizontal grills? Well theres going to be a frosted piece of acrylic mounted behind that and light will shine straight through. Should give a nice glow.





This is just a little tag that goes on the bottom of the back of the case




Up next was the midplate and by this stage my arms were sore. You can fit and mount two power supplies into the case and when consulting Darkmx1000 and some other swedish overclockers, it became clear that dual PSU's was a must have for benching rigs and the like.



So anyhow I got half way through the polish and decided to call it a night.




Last but not least, the frame and front of the case were mounted and welded on (with weldon 3 no less). I am sure you can see that this case is fairly roomy. With that much window space you are going to want to keep the cables clean and the midplate will most certainly help with that.





Thats 9.5 hours of work now and two days progress

I have admittedly run out of 6mm black acrylic and because of May day I have to wait till Wednesday to pick up some more. In the meantime I will twiddle my thumbs and answer any questions you guys may have about the case.

 

Nice to see your making the best of that awesome machine Dan, looks a great case your creating for sale, I'd be just the same designing a whole lot of the time, bet it's like christmas as a kid every day knowing you can go at it with that, congrats dude .

Question
How much will these go for or is it still a way off deciding that?

Lastly can't wait to see Kyubu in action once bulldoser shows what it can do in comparison to what intel have going but yes I'm keen to see the end product of this so subscribing .

 

The quality of your work is.....Epic! and yes we all want to know how much it will go for...

 

So far its been 10.5 hours and I won't know the total material cost until much later. I already have deposits down for the first two but those deposits are covering material cost only. I wouldn't expect the case to be any less than 1300AUD at this rate but even at that cost I might get more worldwide orders than I can physically handle. Pricing is always a very touchy area and it is one that I would like to get correct straight up.

 

I can't get enough of this mod, even when I have run out of 6mm acrylic I just can't stop modding it. Here is that light diffuser for the "barcode array". One frosted panel wasn't enough so I put two there and threaded them together with automotive grade nickel cap screws.


The cap screws sit just above the panel, they look awesome and the lighting has a subtle but striking effect.


Of course the panel is clear diffused so you can try a colour combination that suits you.






Green and black never gets old.





Not going to fill all the drive bays up? Worry not; 6mm thick and hairline polished, these drive bay covers are worth their weight in bling factor.

Until next time!

 

I like the light barcode bit, could that be used for hdd activity?.

 

It could if you plug a normal LED into the HDD activity pins yes

 

sweet looking case so far mate, so jealous of the hardware you have in your posession! Looking forward to the end result

If only I could even just afford the $1300!

 

The curved louvered corners looks great. I like the light slot thing in the front of the case. I do think however that it would look better if it was secured from behind without screws going through the front panel. To me the extra screws are just distracting from the looks of the front panel and are unnecessary.

 

It's looking awesome but I gotta agree with voigts, the screws should at least be black for this one.

 

A black acrylic case is a awesome idea and it looks really good so fare.

I also think it is better if you use black screws. Nice cnc machine you got there by the way.

 

awesome looking so far - sub'd and +rep

 

Got any suggestions for a way to spray paint the screws in such a way that the paint won't chip? I don't mind spraying the screws black but an effective and recommended method would be great.

Unfortunately I have accuracy problems if I was to flip the piece over and mill the other side, with screw holes you work with very tight tolerances.

 

I don't know how it is for getting black screws in Aus, I use high tensile black bolts, my uncle who came over from Aus for the first time in about 20 years noticed them straight away so I'm guessing you should be able to get them there. He's a boat engineer over there.

I've sprayed bolt heads before too & no paint chipped off but I did scuff, prime, colour & clear coat them just like painting anything else but might be bad if they are philips head screws, not sure but do know socket head types paint well.

I used blue tack by plugging the bolts all the way in so just the bolt heads catch the paint & mask the other ends, got a pile done all at once & no chipping even when I try to, did this with normal canned automotive spray too .

 

Just buy black screws. They are not painted but made black through some other process.

 

^ It is the cheaper hassle free better way but in the rare case you can't get the type you want then painting is just another option.

 

Couldn't you have glued the diffuser piece to the front panel, removing the need for screws altogether? I love how this is looking so far though. Great work as always!

 

The bonding glue spreads thinner than water, it would have ruined the diffusion effect. The cap screws I have are quite hard to find in a black that actually looks good, I would need to paint the ones I have.

 

I suppose they could even be powder coated although it would be quite a PITA to do unless you did a big load of them all at once.

Bad idea, wasn't thinking right, it would be a nightmare to do lol.

I was thinking a sheet of alu with a massive load of screw holes in & putting all the screws through so just the heads are hanging out when coating, but on a little further thought maybe it is doable if used the special heat resistant silicone washers to keep them separate from the panel for easy removal afterwards but still being connected to the panel so the powder sticks.

 

I suppose if the current colour of the screw heads is the only main issue then this scratch build is doing well