Scratch Build – In Progress Project :: Kaiten X [08-17] Light Port Madness

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[12-21-2009] The Return

January 2010 Mod of the Month Nomination

Hi Bit Tech!

I saw a long time ago the Pype Invasion cases and was more or less inspired by the unique shape. While different, it was still a pretty practical case arrangement.

In the end I merged the ideas of a custom case and the X shaped chassis together.

My goals were for something fairly small (it is smaller than an Invasion) and LAN party oriented, packed full liquid cooling, plenty of space for hard drives and other gear while staying slim and logical. And of course, bling it up wherever possible

Stage 0.0 :: Design

0.1 Concept Sketches

0.1.1 Concept


Sketchup is good an all, but nothing beats paper and pencil for me



0.1.2 Scale Drawing

My second revision scale sketch



0.2 Full Scale Study Model

Then I broke out Mr. Foamcore to make a full sized model. Im not sure why but I can never get a real feel for something until it really exists. -


The tray is a Lian Li microATX without the back plate.




Mockup for a Danger Den MAGII LE. I have read that they have a high failure rate, so this might change.






The Invasion has support for a 120mm sized rad, my version takes it to a full Danger Den 240 GT.



The lower pods will contain hard drives and optical drives, though I haven't quite decided on the arrangement just yet.

 

looks good!. now get and make the actuall case!

 

what he said

 

Great Idea, the component layout looks wicked, and as they said, get modding

 

Sweet, looking great so far! Will be following this one.

Btw, how much are those foamcore boards?

 

Dude that rocks! I always thought something like that would be cool. Looking foreward to more!

 

that is really neat. The compartmentalization of the hardware is definitely a plus.

 

Thanks guys!

@Macros_the_Black - I found mine at Office Max/Depot for $15US, for which you get 3 giant boards

After burning some brain oil I came up with what I think will be the final hard drive arrangement-

0.2.1 Drive Pod







I allowed some space for 40mm fans in the back of the cage. The drive pod will be separated from the motherboard side in the end.

Stage 1 :: Construction

1.1 Core Frame

1.1.1 Front and Rear Plates

Though still designing some parts of this thing, I started construction of the initial framework.





I found this giant sheet of orange 5mm cast acrylic sitting out in the back of a sign shop. Looked like they just used it outside to paint stuff on Given no laws in my state about public trash, it was quickly brought home





The first plate was nearly done. I had some severe problems with my Jigsaw though. While cutting the blade would deflect and no longer cut straight, so it was a battle the whole way through. I'm not totally sure, but I think it was because the tool was just too cheap. Ironically, it is laser guided!



As dusk came on I was sick of my Jigsaw and switched to my coping saw to finish it up.



Under moonlight both were finished aside some filing and sanding. The protective paper looks all scratched up (and it is), but only the edges will show through.

 

I always say the best plexi is free plexi. I hope no one from the sign shop reads this though...

 

Only 15 USD?! That sound like a pretty ok price. =) Very nice 'price' on that acrylic as well!!! ^_^

I like the arcs by the HDDs.

No to self: 'Doubble-scrap the idea to get cheap-ass tools, run em till they burn and then get good ones!' Thanx for the pointer.

 

Hey, give me back my plexi!

 

No!

And yes, cheap tools are never worth it. My advice: think about if you would rather pay extra for a good tool that you will be satisfied with, or save money and be irritated with it constantly. My Jigsaw came in a box with mis-spelled words on it, that should have been my first clue

I will have a small update a little later today, I Finally found a good supply for smoked acrylic

 

"box with mis-spelled words..." lol

Oooo, update! 8D¨
Damnit, now you have me refreshing every 10 minutes. <=)

 

Is that this harbor freight jigsaw?
http://www.harborfreight.com/cpi/ctaf/displayitem.taf?Itemnumber=92772
I was thinking of getting that one because it's so cheap, but I guess it's crap. What did it do to you?

Looking forward to the update

 

Looking all sow for updates. This project promises.

 

Ohh cheezeit! Stop uncovering my dirty secrets Yes it was a Harbor Freight one...it cuts other things ok, just not thick acrylic so well.

Alright, mini update time! Sorry this is later than I said, life just has to happen sometimes. It is so inconsiderate to log updates



I had some trouble finding a good source for acrylic, but alas, my long search is over!

Tap Plastics as it turned out had what I was looking for in the form of Solar Gray acrylic, which is basically a smoked look. I ordered 2 sample squares to make sure the colors were right. This stuff is 3mm, so the 5mm should be darker.



Tinker Belle approves

0.2.2 Onboard Display Mockup





I've had a PSone screen kicking around for far too long, so I am going to mount it in Kaiten X


I am going to go to my plastic supplier tomorrow to hopefully bring home some 5mm smoked acrylic so i can keep building, assuming I dont find some in the garbage before that . Here is a rough idea of what I plan to do for the basic frame -



Luckily I have a nice long 3 day weekend ahead, so I should make some progress

 

WOW that looks great, that will look so sick when its done! Nice work

 

Me likey! Orange LEDS!

 

Thanks guys!

My trip to the plastics store turned out even better that I could have hoped. Not only did I get the smoked acrylic I was looking for, but I also found these babies-



These are special blades for cutting thick acrylic! I had just about given up hope on using my jigsaw for this build, but these really saved the day. They cut smooth and straight. They are relatively rough compared with a standard 18TPI metal/plastics blade.

Given the new blades, I got some good work time in.

1.1.2 Core Supports Motherboard Tray, Drive Rails, and Radiator Support





I made a little design change here from my model and decided to integrate the mobo tray and the drive rail into a single piece. Here is also the beginning of the Radiator support.





I also decided to do away with most of the Lian Li mobo tray and use just the backplate, eventually riveted into place. Simplicity when possible is one of my modding mantras





I reused the Lian Li mobo standoffs. Tapping wasn't necessary as it turned out, I just placed them and cranked them in, they seem solid.








Using a stepper drill bit I countersunk the holes for the hard drive screws. I found some goofy long bolts in my parts stash that had enough length to work. One of those rare moments having a lot of extra stuff can work for you



After cutting out the opposite drive rail, this is what I ended up with so far.

 

Whoa! How about an update!

Yes, it has been about 3 months since an update. Why this is?

Well, I came to a point where I realized that most of my hobbies had been curbing me to not pursue my true dreams career wise. For about 7 years I've had my foot about half in, for some reasons I needed to really go further. So, things like Kaiten took a back seat for a while, giving birth to my new small business, Langear XL

As much of the heavy lifting is done I have resurrected my efforts on Kaiten in the last few weeks while doing business as well.

With my renewed interest in the project I am also hoping to bring more quality to this log with better pictures (bad bad bad) and hopefully video updates soon, so it is a rebirth in a few ways

So, let's get to it!

First here is where we left off, with the rough core frame pieces being cut-



The back plate received some polishing treatment



Drive rails drilled to use a bolt/grommet arrangement

1.1.2.1 Radiator Support Ascetics



Naturally, the first thing I had was a problem! While carving out the hole for the radiator barbs, the acrylic managed to crack. Luckily part of the plan was a cover for this area so the actual acrylic will not be seen, so I used a little acrylic solvent to glue it back together. It is very watery so the solvent went right into the crack. It is ugly, but just as strong as the original.



A few designs



I cut 7 of these with a fret saw. After a test fit 7 seemed like plenty over the 11 in my concept



Under the slats you can see the aluminum cover made from scrap Lian Li aluminum (dont ask )





Even a steady hand with a fret saw it is impossible to get the exact same shape without some tweaking, so I clamped them together to receive some love from my Dremel.



Light will come from 7 ultrabright orange LEDs



A first for one of my mods was the use of electrical perf board to keep things nice and neat. Originally I tried this with a single piece, but the spacing of the slats made it impossible. I ended up making a configuration of 2x2x2x1.



After some trial and error the light boards work!



With the help of my new best workshop friend for some flame polishing...



This is what I got! The aluminum will be polished at some point.

Progress is still slow, so hopefully I will be farther along soon, and post more often than every 3 months!