Triple TFT Stand - October 2003 After a bit of a break, the stand was really bugging me... It just wasn't up to the job of supporting the screens... Time for something that worked. Having had plenty of time to think about it I had gone through several ideas in my head, and on paper, and came up with the following requirements: 1) Must support the screens securely. 2) Small footprint. 3) Neat look, similar to that of the original stands. 4) 10 degree angle in on side displays to give even viewing angle. 5) Some kind of cable management (3 into 1 power). This should do the job... Box section aluminium. To provide the angle I made V shaped cuts at either end after determining where the screens would need to sit. I bent the arm at these points and TIG welded it to provide a strong joint. To attach the screens to the arm I needed a good bracket that could be bolted into place and provide the right mounting centres for the screens (VESA standard 100mm). I produced 3 CNC milled polycarbonate plates to do the job. The plates are sloted so they can slide into position allowing me to position the screens correctly then bolted into poistion preventing gaps between the TFT surround. So the screen weight about 7Kg each. Supporting that weight needed something strong, especially for the side screens which hand out from the middle. Next task was the stand itself. The balance of the setup was somewhere infront of the middle screen, this meant I would need to place the foot forward to prevent the whole thing topling over! After hacking apart an original stand I ended up with something looking like this: I still wasn't quite sure how to attach this to the main arm though... So I dag around in the garage for a while to see what I could find and came up with this: The tube was attached securely to the base using 4 M6 bolts through a plate I welded to the tube end at an angle. This left me with a base which allowed me to support the centre of gravity by having the foot further forward. Using the mitre box saw I cut the ends of two tubes (one being the tube with the plate attached for attaching to the base) and welded them together. This took some time to setup to get right. But my patience payed off and I ended up with a stand that wasn't off on the piss. Fortunately, when I had originally found the tubing it was attached to a nice little bracket,, This was promptly hacked and welded to form a clamp onto the tubing, forming the next part. The rest was a simple case of welding this bracket to a plate, then this plate to the main arm. A bolt was used to tighten the clamp and secure it in place... I later found it was not sufficient using a prexisting hole and welded a little extra onto the back of the clamp. Only finishing touches now... And all is done! Please post your comments in the discussion thread.
Dammit... I wish I had a couple of grand, a workshop full of welding gear and a CNC mill. But with all these things, I'm sure I wouldn't make such a nice job of it as you have, well done.
All one needs is a little time and patience... Anyone can produce quality work if they put a bit of effort into it Of course welding gear, machining equipment and a bit of experience wouldn't go a miss
January 2004 - Front Panel work When was that last time I used my floppy drive.. for the life of me I can't remember... So why have it? I decided enough was enough and wanted to remove the offending beast . But what to fill the hole with? Fortunately, the double 3.5" bay on the front of the coolermaster is just the right size for the Noritake 64 line display... Of course, as always nothing is easy... this required some planning. After some careful measuring and marking out I decided to add a vent at the front too to keep the harddisk drives cool. With the idea in mind I taped the VFD to the inside of the panel to see if it would fit... Unfortunately, no. The drive bays come too close to the back of the screen and touch the PCB. It didn't hit by much, but enough to make me rethink. The simplist way to fix the problem was to sink the screen into the panel, but being aluminium this was not easy. And so off to the local engineering firm I went with a quick sketch. While that was being cut out I got to work altering the pin header on the display... Normally this stands vertically off of the board and the cable exits straight out... Not any more! I desoldered the connector, bent the pins 90 degrees and resoldered it onto the opposite side of the board. After a call from the engineer's I went and picked up my panel... with added hole and recess for the screen. To follow the theme of my PC I used a blue filter in front of the VFD. Both were attached with carefully applied amounts of double sided carpet tape to enable me to line the screen up perfectly into position. Then the VFD was epoxied into position using Devcon 5 minute epoxy. As you can imagine I have no plans to remove the screen! Well that was the screen mounted... Just this gapping big hole in the front of the PC! I already have plans for that... Please post your comments in the discussion thread or here if you can keep them short!
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January 2004 - Front Panel Work (Grill) Obviously, I couldn't leave the hole open... I wouldn't want anything getting into the PC (fingers, mice, etc.) Besides it looks ugly bare. In a previous trip to homebase I had spotted some nice mesh which would fit the job nicely. The sheet nibbler tool made short work of cutting out some pieces the right size to cover the hole. Which I epoxied into place, again using Devcon 5 minute epoxy. And finally for some finishing touches... 4mm Aluminium bar, carefully cut to length and press fitted into place in front of the mesh! As you've probably noticed I have also fitted a finer mesh behind the grill. The main reason for this is to hide the inners a little better. Please post your comments in the discussion thread or here if you can keep them short!
January 2004 - Case Handles Like any good PC my case does get shuttled back and forth to my mates houses for Lan Party's! It's not the lightest thing to carry, and the case is not the easiest thing to grab hold of! Handles were an obvious solution, and so a trip to homebase was called for which turned up these: OK, so I didn't take a picture of the handles on their own... Pretty straight forward to mount, drill some holes in the top and screw them on... Just a small bit of modification needs to get the screws in around the powersupply cage. I should point out at this point that I didn't just drill some holes into the case to fit these... I spent some time carefully measuring to make sure I got them in the right places! There are a number of pop-rivets and other items to miss when drilling through the top panel! After some time I finally got the case back together now with nice carry handles! Please post your comments in the discussion thread.
You should weld a handle to the lcd frame that extends to the top. Then make a folding aluminum screen guard so you can carry it, facing your leg, to the lan with one hand.
Like the idea of the screen guard, but not sure about carrying it with one hand... it weighs about 40lbs as it is! At the moment, I have a stap attached to the frame which I put over my shoulder and then carry it with the screens facing down using my hand to hold the base which is out to the side.
Hey that strap over the back thing gave me a better idea. Make a backpack incorporating the hard screen guard with shoulder/waist strap. Screens just clip in and you strap it on your back. The angle of the screens would wrap around you a bit. Just make sure you go through narrow doors sideways. Could also put them sideways so they don't stick out to the sides. In this case the front of the screens would face away from you, and settle into your lower back.
Nevermind all the mods, I'm just really jealous of the variety of tools you have to work with. BTW, I will be using the IDE cable mod in my project currently in-progress.
Yeah, that screen stand is AMAZING. Companys should really start marketing tri screen setups and stuff. (They could learn alot from you)
So very awesome. I remember the first time I saw this with the Triple TFTs in BF1942, and I was stunned. It's only become better. I'll definately be using this as inspiration for my next system (lets just say Triple 17" TFTs, Dual PCI Express x16 videocards, watercooling, and maybe dual processors if I can afford that) Fantastic work nonetheless. Looking foward to seeing more of this.
Very nice. I've got the same radiator and mounted internally, it does take up a fair amount of room Awesome monitor setup
