Scratch Build – In Progress Project: Cubeleon

Update 1

The first update on Bit-tech, the 25th on the dutch forums

I'll start this update by making the pumphousing. I won't finish it entirely, but it's a good start Because I've designed the pumphousing in SolidWorks, I was able to 'flat pattern' it and print it out at a 1:1 scale.





This is the glue I use to glue the paper on the tape and aluminium:







This picture is almost identical as the one above, but I just liked it, so I'll post it



A rough cut, done by hand:



The rest has to be done by filing, a lot of filing. I cut off most of the tape, because you can't see a thing when it's still stuck on there.





Done filing A few more mounting holes were drilled, and the bend lines were drawn at the backside.



It's a lot easier to polish when it's not bent yet. The scratches were quite deep, so I started with 120 grain sanding paper:







If that would have been the only part, it would turn out quite boring More parts!







This part was rather hard to fabricate, because the bend was quite weird. It turned out to be exactly the wat I designed it. Had to cut the little thingies out to make the bend right.



The second mount:



To mount the top plate I made four 4mm spacers. When I tried to fit it in, I found out the fitting of the pump was just over 4mm. It fits this way, but it isn't really nice. To keep it this way is option 1, option 2 is making another 4 spacers, but 5mm long. But two are not enough, so I thought of 2 more options Number 3 involves cutting a hole in the top plate to give the fitting it's clearance. And the last one is using that port as an intake. The plexi pomp top has two intakes, so you can choose which one to use. Since I still have to figure out how to get from the reservoir to the pump, this may become the intake port. Have to figure that out some day soon



Now it's time for part 2, and that part involves the radiator grill. It is supposed to be painted black one day, but I'll have to fill some holes and gaps first. This one is the biggest, the aluminium melted during welding and left this big gap:



This is the bondo I will be using. Smelly stuff



Before I could start with the bondo, I had to file the corner-profiles to the same height. Using the mill at school I made this 17,5mm high piece of steel. I got one of 16,5mm also, but that wasn't part of the plan



When using a clamp it's easy to use. If I'm filing steel, I can stop filing



It was so easy, it was done in 15 minutes. I didn't have to measure every 30 seconds, something I had to do when I wouldn't have made the steel piece.



Bondo time First layer is a think layer. I'll sand it smooth tomorrow. The first corner:



And that makes four:



I will add another layer of bondo if this one isn't good enough. After that, this stuff will go on top of it. It is bondo also, but in a spray can



For the upcoming polishing I need a better polishing compound. The one I use right now is still too rough in my opinion, so I bought the finest one they had The price is still a little rough though



And some high gloss varnish:



That all for today. If you'll keep posting, I will consider posting another update soon The last few weeks I've been in the mood for modding, the months ago nothing really got done. We'll see if I can keep ik up

 

Where did you buy all that stuff? Gamma?
The glue spray is particulary interesting, its perfect for sticking paper on metal. Does the paper come off easily afterwards?

 

spray glue eh? got to be better than Pritt Stick or double sided tape...man that stuff leaves nasty residue.

very nice work, nice and clean

 

holy smokes! any pics of the cnc mill? the fan grill in first page... well we all know what it looks like

 

The spray glue is from Gamma indeed, the polishing stuff from a car shop and the spray bondo from Fixet. I've been cycling around town It's sticky enough to keep the paper stuck to the metal (I only use it with masking tape first) and it comes off when you want it to come off. It remains a little sticky though

It's much better than pritt stick, I can tell you that I tried using double sided tape before, but that didn't really work for me. You use a lot of it and everything keeps sticking to something else when sawing.

Tnx Haven't got a pic of the mill, but I can get one. I think I will be using it a few more times in the months to come. And once we get that lasercutter, I think I will be using that one also

 

I really like your mod brink! I've been thinking of building a cube case for a while, and your's is just amazing to see. Heck, I've been going on the dutch forums just to see more updates .

 

Very nice! you have good stuff there, hey How you did that draw! it with SolidWorks but HOW

 

It looks like Adobe Illustrator prints to me, love that program for cutting templates

 

You'll have to draw the parts as a sheetmetal part. That means you have to create a baseplate and corners. Then you go to the drawing section and you choose Flat Pattern. That'll do the trick, so no Illustrator needed

 

Very cool idea, especially the bending thing.
<<<<<<<<<< Wants to see more

 

this is looking very promising..........

I would use the top inlet.........


Subscribed...........

Alan

 

WTF! WHAT K IND OF SCHOOL DO YOU GO TO!!!

 

Silly Teyber! We discussed this before. EVERYONE in the Netherlands has access to a mill. The government gives them one when they turn 21.

The new pump housing is looking great!

 

And why should I use that one? I haven't read anything about it yet, but I can imagine it would result in a better flow.

The school has been on a tight budget for a few years, a little while ago they got a new management team and they found out that they still had a pile of money somewhere. So they bought about a hundred new pc's and a lasercutter They just have to adjust the doors, cause it doesn't fit through them

 

I had some problems with air in the pump while using the side inlet.........
the problem disappeared after I switched to the top inlet.........

Alan

 

good going

looking forward to your next update...

 

I will keep that in mind, tnx for the advice

Thanks, me too

 

im going to the netherlands next summer... maybe... i will get one?

lol so true so true XD

 

Update 2
The last updat was way too long ago, so it's time for another one

De last time I put bondo on the outer grill. I've been sanding it down with 400 grit sanding paper. I decided to do that outside, because it doesn't exactly smell like flowers



A little while ago, a big piece of aluminium was melt away here from the welding:



The corners don't look perfect on the inside yet:



While sanding and filing I always wear a dust mask. It doens't smell nice, so probably it isn't very healthy to breath the dust from polyester bondo.



The upper-right corner needed another layer of bondo:



Much better





Now it's time to mount it to the case. I chose to drill the upper en lower holes on another place, so I can't mix it up while mounting. That will save some time in the future



It took a while to get it mounted horizontally. After measuring I clamped it in like this to drill the holes:



And mounted. I won't be using standard hex bolts, because their head is too big. The bolts will be covered, so no one will see them. These will do.





I went on with working on the motherboard cover edge. I will use these two aluminium profiles:



After a little sanding with the disc sander, the corner is right angled:



These are the two types of plexiglass I will use. One is 5mm black AC-Ryan plexi, the second one is 2mm clear plexi that I had lying around. I will use them so pass trough the light of the leds.



The easiest way to file the 2mm plexi is to clamp it to the aluminium and sand it down with a dremel sanding disk. Normally I don't like using the dremel, because it isn't very accurate, and it's easy to scratch the parts, but for this job it's an ideal tool



At this pic I just glued the two parts together:



After this I tested the amount of light coming through, almost none! It would probably have been better if I used clear plexi instead of black, but I'm not going to remake that part. Instead I will break off the 2mm plexi, because it has no use to keep it on there.



Still had a little mistake to fix. I drilled a hole at the wrong place in the aluminium, but because I am not able to fix that, I will adjust the plexi glass. I used a mill bit for the dremel.



After a bit of filing it looks like this:



A little mockup, it will look like this when it's finished:



Because I removed the 2mm plexi, I will have to think of a new way to mount the plexi. I used a little piece of 5mm plexi:



I used the mill at school to cut it down to a thinkness of 3,5mm, instead of the normal 5mm. It wasn't easy to clamp it in, but I managed to do that properly. At this picture you still can see the marks the mill left behind:



I told you it was thinner now



I need it to be in 9 pieces, so I had to draw some lines:



And cut them:



And glue them



This it how it will work. The acrylic standoffs will be leaning against the aluminium profiles, so the alu standoff will be 0,5mm away from the profile. The acrylic will later be glued to the alu pieces.



Another mockup, with the plexi added. The hex bolts will be replaced with countersunk ones:



The picture is a little dark, but the plexi really is there



Not totally straight, but it will be in the future



Now i'm going to paint the acrylic pieces black. I went outside and used a lot of newspapers to prevent paint getting on the floor, but I painted the floor black anyway You can still see where the newspapers have been lying



Someone here at Bit-tech said putting your spray cans in a bowl of warm water would prevent bubbles and blobs of paint coming onto your workpiece. So I tried, I couldn't do much damage anyway.



This is what the parts look like after paint. It worked out well, but the surface looks a little weird to me. I don't know why that happened.





As this update wasn't long enough yet, I also decided to work on the pump housing. The first thing I did was removing the ugly sticker on the pump. Otherwise that would have been visible.



Last time I sanded this plate down with 120 grit sandins paper. Now I did the same with 280 grit paper:
De vorige keer heb ik deze plaat geschuurd met korrel 120, nu met korrel 280:



Which results in a surface like this. I also really liked the picture



And after 600 grit:



Sanded the backside to 280 grit, because some parts will be visible. I used the paper to prevent scratches coming onto the other side.




And coolmiester style, I *poof*polished it To accomplish this I sanded it down to 1200 grit and polished it with 3 types of polishing compounds. Unfortunately when watching from this angle, you can still see a lot of scratches:



At this angle it looks like it's chromed



At this picture you can see both effects:



That's all for this time folks. Next time I will show you how I will bend the coverplate, I'm really excited to see how it will look when it's finished
If anyone has a comment, don't be afraid so say so. I will be listening to your input

 

I love your high quality work! Keep up the great job, I look forward to updates!