Welcome to Na'ir al Saif. I'm taking a different tack from my last build and going for a more open look, with transparent acrylic panels on an aluminium frame. I'm also going to be using thicker material, both for looks and rigidity. Also, I've had to rewrite most of this log because of a stuff up by my image host provider. As a consequence, there may be some sections appearing in a different order from the original, and some images couldn't be found so they are omitted and the text has been removed. Because of all this, I recommend that you use the ' Authors mode' as this only shows posts by me. A lot of the comments from forum members will not make any sense in the place they are in. To use this feature just use the drop down box 'view mode', and select 'view authors posts'. This feature is located at the top right of the topic you are reading. For those directed here from a link on my web site, you are already in authors mode. See you soon.
Wow! You don't mess around do you? My heart goes out to that graphic card... Mind you, i would expect nothing less from oldnewby! I'm watching, this promises to be good!
I've done almost the same for a project I'm still making (For laptop drives also). But I use a blank PCI from a server and a different approach. I have to upload the pics. Nice.
Just thought of something, why use a valuable pci-express slot for this? wouldn't a pci be more appropriate? I know it depends on your mobo, but it just seems to use up lots of space to me.
Thanks guys. So lets start. I'm starting with the heart of the case, namely the motherboard tray/support. This is cut from 4mm plate with my hardworking jigsaw. Filing finishes the edges. Holes drilled for the mobo risers And countersunk for M3 screws. This tray will be fixed to the case in the center only. So mounting holes are drilled and countersunk. A bit more cleaning up on the edges......... A quick check that the risers match up with an old broken mobo. And then a wet sand to see how this may look on the finished build. This will have to be done at the very end of the build again, but I just want to get a look. Back soon.
shroud it! Is this going to have a shrouded cooler, in true GFX card style? you should definitely stealth the HD behind a shroud like this: that would definitely
got to agree, flip the HDD around and drill a port hole in the card so you connect to the drives, then you could shroud the whole thing and have a cooler blowing across the drives.
Gonna keep an eye on this, ofc. BTW would it not have been easier to just use a hot air gun to blast those components away? I know that's how I scavenge components from old PCBs.
Thanks everyone. The support for the motherboard tray has a single arm attaching to the center of the tray. This part is marked up and cut from 8mm plate. I tried using some cutting fluid on the jigsaw blade, but this didn't seem to make cutting any easier but did make an awful mess. So I'll stick with dry cutting. And some more heavy duty filing. Now my design calls for some big ass holes to be cut in this part so I bought a cheap set of hole saws. On the box it says 'not to be used for metal', but they are bi-metal saws and I'm sure, that with some lubrication, and taking some extra time to make the cuts, they will work well. Of course the extra 'grunt' of my new drill press helps. The hole saws worked well but left a slightly rough inside edge. These are cleaned up with some sanding drums in a power drill. And this is how the two parts will fit together. But the original design just didn't look right in the flesh. So some mods on the fly were done. With one side done. And I like this much better. The finished part is drilled, tapped and fitted. Back soon.
The design calls for two fans but I wanted some chunky, fat looking things. I tried a few designs before settling on the final look. First we start with some foam easter eggs. To get the "nose cone" of the fan, one of the eggs is cut in half. The short, fat half is discarded. The other half will be fixed to the fan like so. So to get a fat chunky appearance two frames are glued and bolted together. Then the gap in between is bogged up with filler. The struts are removed from the motor support, and it's smoothed down. The outside of the new frame is covered with some plastic model siding and primered. Now I tried various paints and primers on the foam but usually ended up with a small lump that looked like pluto, foam doesn't like any solvent based finishes. So I finaly decided to cover it in two part epoxy and this worked a treat. I gave it three coats. After sanding and gluing, the nose had some filler applied. A few areas on the frame also needed some more filler. Then some spray putty was applied to the parts. I could have left one of the fan motors attached to the frame but I didn't like the look of it and I wanted the fan motor to be removable, so a new support needed to be made. 3mm alu was used for this. This was cut out with the jigsaw and filed to the near final shape. And the motor attached with double sided tape to get a look. Now some holes need to be marked up and drilled. I like to take measurements directly from the work-piece so I've found that when you need to find the locations of blind fitting points, it easy to put the fixing screws or bolts in, and on the work-piece put three layers of masking tape on the area where you need to mark. Then align the part till you are happy and apply pressure to the part directly above the screw. This will leave a clear impression of the screw head for you to drill. Drilled, countersunk and rough sanded. And we have a fat turbine-like fan. OK it looks like crap at the moment but I'm still working out the colour scheme. Now I think you can guess that it would have been a miracle if the new fan+nose was well balanced just like that, and it's not. Mind you it's not too bad, but I will have to rig up a way to put the fan in the drill stand and balance it. TBC..........
