OK Ladies and Gents. After a 3 month hiatus I am back, and ready to mod. And guess what. I too have fallen for the idea of a mod made to tribute a car. Its an idea we all get at some point in our beer fueled hours at the drawing boards, and if you think about it, its not a bad idea. Both cars and computers are easy machines to fall in love with... This is intended to be a low budget project. This would be my first mod of this scale. For me its usually just a CCFL install, or a vandal resistant switch or two, so I'll need a lot of time to develop technique and ideas. (and a lot of help from the Bit-tech community!) We all have our ideas for car mods. I however, have too many. 1. Idea 1. Well. It could only be the Mitsubishi Evolution. The cause of tyre smoke at traffic lights and bed wetting in spiky-haired men. It has been in all the Fast and the Furious movies, and now there is a new one, the Evo X. The basis of this mod is its high tech appearance. Water cooled most definitely, with nice and gaudy chrome detailing. Has to be in red. End of story. LCD displays, neon lighting. I can go to town with this without worrying too much about spoiling the 'essence' of the tribute. 2. Idea 2 - Old School Mercedes Roadster. I.E. The Mercedes Benz 300Sl Gullwing Coupe. Perhaps the coolest car ever made. It is just so sophisticated and elegant, a mod to tribute this would have to be really good. I mean REALLY good. This would need beautifully shaped and crafted panels, with a minimum on the gaudiness. I might have to splash out and use some more elegant materials. Maybe even replicate the gullwing doors. I'd have to take a leaf from coolermeister's book and use the mercedes arctic silver paint. Or maybe off-white... 3. Idea 3 - Lamborghini Reventon. Apparently pronounced 'Rebenton' I'd really need to splash out to make a tribute to this car. It is VERY high tech and VERY cool. Really endless possibilities. Doubt I'd find a lambo badge for cheap on eBay though. The rear lights on this are nice. I would also say Aston Martin, but I doubt I could do it justice. Essentially, I just want your opinions folks. Which would make for the best mod? Any thoughts at all about Car mod ideas which you'd like to share? Perhaps another source of inspiration for me. Feel free to use my ideas if you like them. Modding commences in mid June, after my AS exams.
Got another one already! Idea 4. The Porsche 911. Maybe the Turbo, or perhaps the GT2. Another brilliant car. Just begging for some clever air cooling mechanism. Whats the PC equivalent to a big turbocharger?
No Mach5? I say the Mercedes. There's more identifiable elements to work with. I don't think the Michi-bichi should be honored in any way, and the smoke is from the weak piston rings.
I'd definately go for the merc Old school cars rule! So many ideas for which you could use the gul wing doors ... awesome
agreed, the gullwing would make for killer side panels. and the overall appearance can be very elegant. screw the evo. im so sick of hearing about them. yeah, they're a great car and all. but still. as far as the lambo, i saw someone else doing a mod based on it, and they have quite a head start. so, 300SL definitely. the Porsche would be semi hard to pull off. not as far as the air cooling, but the overall appearance, in my head anyways. i personally have the C6 corvette in my head. i work with them everyday, so its easy to get ideas. lolz.
gullwing or lambo are the only real choices. The Gullwing would have to be a very cleverly shaped build, not a normal sized "box" like most PCs are. The high-tech lambo could be done with more conventional ways, would be easier.
Hmmm... Yeah, there is something really charming about the retro-chic styling of the merc. Does red leather interior invoke any particular emotions for any of you? I'm trying to decide whether it would be better off silver or off-white. It would really need a lot of work to make something reminiscent of the sleek curves and shape of the merc. I'll do some quick sketches and post them up in a bit. I could gullwing-ify the side panels, maybe some vents, like what coolermiester did with the cosmos slr, but i'd have to give it texture and contours. Something with those wheel arches as well... A corvette isn't a bad idea either, though i suppose that would need some muscle in the set up lol.
I agree with the others: the Gullwing is a major classic, one hot car. Someone else here is doing a Reventon styled mod, aren't they?
Hmmm part 2 Mach 5 lol. I'm sure Dexter's Lab did a parody of that once... good times Yep. So now its to the old drawing board! I've made a quick sketch as to how I might attempt to make a 300SL Coupe inspired case. What do you think? Anything you would do differently? The front would be made of layer upon layer of MDF... (shudder)... curved and shaped. Two white LEDs for the headlights? Maybe bulbs instead... And a custom clear acrylic housing so as to make the light more headlight-like. Chrome effect on the surround, and on the grille, and bottom lip. If I choose to WC it, the rad would go here somewhere... Open the lid, in a similar way to the bonnet of original, to reveal the red leather interior. Stitched in red, with chrome detailing. The three dials are reminiscent of old school speedometers, but are actually temperature readouts for the CPU, GPU and HDD. I'm not sure whether this is doable, though I'm on the lookout for parts. If anyone knows any helpful links I would be eternally grateful. Below this, a slot loading DVD drive (less obtrusive) and some custom fan controls. Not sure how to do power button yet. The side panels would be the Gullwing element of the mod. Not only would they be on hinges, but these can cut in to the 'roofline'. On custom hinges, as I doubt a normal hinge can support this type of movement. It will be powered by something like that which lifts up boot/trunk lids: The panel itself will include the side vents, though I'm not sure how to do it best... Naturally it will complement the shape of the car, so I have the idea of a window, much like the originals, to show off my interior. And now, the interior. At this rate, I won't have enough for components just yet, though I'll be sure to choose wisely when I do. Coolermeister painted his interior red.... which is not a bad idea at all... Though I'm not sure. The 300sl was a much more subtle beast than the SLR Mclaren... Maybe a black interior would look better. What do you think? Cooling-wise... I suppose since I have a few spare watercooling parts, it would make sense... deep red coolant anyone? The red and black xilence fans would be a must here: I'd better not try and do too much because I have very little experience, and I might ruin it... All opinions are very welcome.
Oh yeah!!! There is a Reventon case in production already, and its looking pretty good: http://forums.bit-tech.net/showthread.php?t=147994&highlight=reventon&page=2
MDF just doesn't sound so good to me. What about forming something like styrene plastic, the stuff used in plastic model building?
Heh, yeah. like the 1 in bacj to the future. With a direct die phase change cooling system to represent the flux capacitor
I was thinking maybe a riced out evo case, cause that sort of thing can look great when done nicely. But a 500sl with a gullwing door & the famous merc vent would be cooler & more original. After seeing your sketches, definitely the 500SL for sure Just in case you haven't seen it, this case has some excellent vents - you'd have to do them in the 500sl shape of course. The one thing i felt the slr cosmos was missing was a leather interior. I think leather with wood & chrome trim would be great for your case, not to mention the door & everything else in your awesome sketches!! Servo controlled opening door would be nice!
At the moment the only method I've seen enough to try is the mdf design with fiberglass and epoxy resin. Would something like that be appropriate for this case? Forming styrene plastics seems a bit beyond my reach at the moment, though I'll look into it. A B2TF Delorean is a brilliant idea! I wonder if anyone has tried it before? Sounds like pure gold. I would try it, but I really have no idea how to represent this: In a PC case. A phase changing cooling system is a good idea. Something for the more experienced modders to try? The EVO case is an appealing design to try out since so many of the ideas used in modding are based on those used by car customisers. You could even go as far as putting small decals on the side panels... The Cosmos SLR by Coolermeister was a tribute to the SLR MClaren. The sidevents he did were very good, but being a pro, coolermeister also tributes the cases he uses, and the mod is also a tribute to the Coolermaster Cosmos, a very good case. Unfortunately, I don't have access to such resources, so I'll have to start off with a fairly cheap case. What this means however is I can go to town and mutilate dremel it till my heart's content. Woodgrain and leather, with chrome trim definitely sounds like a winner ! (Might need to search for that Cadillac Stacker some dude did a while back...) Servos are a good idea, but I don't know If I can design something with enough torque to lift the heavy side panels, I'll have a look at whats available. I could definitely try something with the front visor. It is very reminiscent of the Asus Vento 3600. This is the case I have always wanted but have never managed to find anywhere in the UK... Its always either not available or out of stock. I managed to settle for a Raidmax instead... beautiful though, isn't it... At the moment I'm struggling to think where I might incorporate some lighting effectively... What colours would I use and where could I place them... any ideas? Maybe leaking out evenly all around the faceplate... and maybe a few white spotlights to show off the interior... embedded in the woodgrain perhaps.... Nothing too brash... Red lighting or white.... And thanks for the compliments and feedback guys! I'm starting up 3dsmax now...
I just had another idea. How about an instrument cluster inside the case, based on a 500SL instrument cluster, which is visible when you open the gullwing door. Maybe something like the speedo for cpu fan rpms and the tacho for hdd activity. There was a thread on using v/u meters for hdd activity, and this v/u meter can be used for the tacho. As for cpu fan speed, there are cheap ic's out there that accept a pulse/fan rpm signal, and convert it to a votage which can be used to drive a v/u = speedo. As for lighting, i'd copy whatever lighting the original car has, which was all white i'm guessing, and red tailights. White is classy too i reckon, suiting the car, and red tailights on the case would look cool aswell!
Meters... Not a bad idea at all... Its definitely worth having a look at v/u meters and IC's to convert values to voltages... Any idea what that IC is called? Still looking for a good instructive website... an A* in GCSE Electronics apparently isn't enough lol. Alternatively, I have just found this: If I could get my hands on one of these, it might be a simple case of dismantling it and rebuilding to my preference. What do you reckon? Lazier option, but more economical... The dash of the merc is gorgeous, and it makes sense for it to be on display when the gullwing doors are open, but alas, considering when the mod is completed, I don't think I would appreciate having to open the doors every time I wanted to check the system temperature... so I think ultimately it would be better off on the front panel (though this is less accurate). Just wondering, should I work with steel, like in the above photo, or maybe a dark wood instead? Any thoughts? I was also considering a red mobo... but with a red leather interior, I think it might be too much... This car could either be silver, Red, Black or White... and I agree with you, white would be the classiest complement to a red interior, in which case, a woodgrain effect would be most suited. In this case, white wall wheels would also fit in... any ideas on how I could put these in? And finally... does anyone have any links to show me how to best wire up a servo? My googling is drawing crap results... I'm also considering how I could incorporate the tail end of the car in the design... Any more thoughts? Sorry if I'm writing too much... there are just soo many possibilities! And here's a thought.... If I had chosen to do the Porsche, what would be the outcome? Porsche 911 + Tall rectangular tower = PORSCHE CAYENNE! lol
