Then there's the simple mod for the USB


Close up of the USB port, tested stronk enuff to withstand the plug in/out process


Nice didn't interfere with the USB 3.0


Going plug crazy!!!!

A simple update for a simple Sunday

back panel reinforcement




Then more acrylic cutting


OMG need to go back to milling some more..
What is it for?

will give more update tomorrow

Finally got the Acrylics cut ans shaved down


1st edge done by myself
easy-peasy

then this happened


Left the other 3 bars to the pros,


Nice and straight


Yesterday have some free time so brought out the heater for bending acrylics


After some toiling and test, nice...


tbc

Add the top in...


Later on done some modification to make it more streamline


these panel will be painted black to cover up the back panel housing the wirings

at the mean time, some reminiscing

Some old drawings, on a stack of paper been crush over 2 years time:






now transfered to new filing





Basically the concept is still there
but it is cleaned up to simplified to realistically do-able


Stuff to do:
1. Cut Acrylic for internal-front but needs to touch up the edges DONE
2. Find rubber mat for HDD cage anti-vibration DONE (show later) DONE
3. Cut holes on top panel for USB DONE and power button moved to front panel
4. Clean all cutting edges - SEMI-DONE For the week ends???
---4a. Prepare acrylic for painting... wait
---4b. HDD cage screw alignment SATISFIED!!!
---4c. Bottom Fan Holes, Acquire fan filters ... 1st half done, 2nd half... eehh ...
---4d. Sidepanel extension cover (acrylics) SATISFIED!!!
---4e. U-Channel edge trim


5. Buy New Acrylic for side panel - Search search search!!!! FOUND!!! MID of THE MONTH... STILL HAVE $$$ MEH?
6. Cut side panel Acrylic - Find the acrylic FIRST!!!!! Need buy, but that is maybe next month case liou...
7. Cut front panel - OII!!! NO SEE ABOVE??? FIND THE BLARDY ACRYLIC FIRST LAHHH!!!! Then we talk.
8. ..
9. .
10. Paint or..or..or... hear me out... what if....Powder Coat?.... sheet... $$$ $$$

This post has been edited by mcchin: Oct 23 2014, 04:04 PM

after a silent week
I am BACK!!!

if anyone still reading this worklog

let get straight to the dirty grime

The thin acrylic need some cleaning


close up

Goddammnit, this stuff is hard

after scrapping with a aluminum bar

The goop is clean off by something not expected



The thermal compound cleaning solvent is very good in dissolving the protective layer melted glue

Finished products




so the product is cleaned
Not shiny, its okay, since I intend to paint over these part
if not, Acrylic is easily buffed back to shininess
(not a crack, but some lint )


Then on the same day received this:


can't do anything in the weekdays since have to travel
then got some time off on Thursday and got down to cutting, with just an angle grinder


YEAH GOING FOR THE Lockheed F-117 Nighthawk/Northrop Grumman B-2 Spirit CASE LOOK!!!


eerrr.... no, it is just the left overs

this is the parts i cut out

the smaller piece is to replace the HDD cage plates
the long pieces is the front, the square is the side panel

A comparison between the old acrylic (~2.7mm) and the new one (~8mm)


So what will be needed to be done in the coming weeks

1. Clean the edge of the cut piece - Tommorow (or today, saturday)
2. Starts some base coat painting, if possible
3. Get some magnet-screws drilling done
4. PAINT!! PAINT!!! PAINT!!!!!
5. Then install the parts

The closer it gets the harder for me, as always...

the fire is just not there....


Well
I skip a lot of the milling/drilling process pictures
here's the side panel attached, paper yet to be removed


The other side


as you see, vertically on the left side


I got greedy and try to maximised the window size. Forgot to take account the frame thickness and in the end the big screw would not fit in, unless i cut away the frame (because the side panel need to slide in) as you can see the pencil marks

in the end settle for a small replacement holding screw inside and the 3 big screw will be just ornament stuck in for sake of filling up the hole


Some small mods

original


went back milling to open up the middle pocket to bigger size to facilitate easier screw removal


also seen in the picture above (forgot to take individual pic)
is the HDD cage assemble with the new 8mm plates on both end
Now the HDD cage is solid as fark!

A new addition


A partitioning plate to tidy up the cables
This only for sata connector drives

As you can see the 3rd picture the bottom of the plate doesn't run parallel with the body
so have to add in something to push it out

Taddaaa!!!



TBC(pic limits)

Continuing from the previous post

Close up, as usual


if you look closely, between the two screws, there is a hole drilled out
and if you look up from that middle screw hole, you can see I cracked the plate drilling out the hole

Yeah, another one of those lack of foresight fakaps

Still the brace is able to hold the plate in place


Now at least the plate run (almost) parallel with the body


and if you are one of those with keen eyes
I uses a type of clips to hold the bottom part in place with the casing


its a type of clips use to secure lid to a container

which really is amazing it fits so perfectly


Now whats left?

1. Front panel - On going
2. Spray painting - The reason i dread when getting close to the project end
3. Assembly???? whenever that be

BIGGGGGG!!!!!!! UPDATE

One of the crucial process
but before that some smaller updates

Bought myself this

a 1/2 inch drill bit

Done a lot of this


and ...

Finally done this


Close up


If you read from the start, you can guess the function of the holes
if not, then this is it


not much deep here, just around 1/2 the thickness (4mm deep)

Not gonna hold well to knocks dislodging it ..

so.....
The hole here is 16+mm
while the the drill bit above is 1/2 inch (~12.54mm)
and if you notice, the drill bit is flatten at the end and the inside the big hole is another step down smaller hole

what is the use of the smaller hole?
for this....

magnets!!!! HOW DO THEY WORKSS????!!!

I have a bunch of them actually


Fit nicely in the slot


So the plan is like this,
Find a way to stick the magnets to the board (already thinking of clear epoxy
and the board will hold on to the 6 screw heads


continue next post

So basically the front look of the front panel


What is needed to be done

1. Front Panel
------a. Stick the magnet to the acrylic
------b. Bend the top of the front panel
------c. Paint the FP

2. Side panel
------a. Paint or
------b. Apply tint layer + some design

3. The case
------a. Tear down???
------b. Paint
------c. re-apply brace

4. Misc
------a. Buy New Cooler Heatsink
------b. Buy Fans
------c. Drill hole for extra drive slot at the bottom

then end with whole system assembly

Project realization:

Point of no return


A little bit of this


Initial test run, messy transfer to the hold


so changed to using this


tested to work flawlessly

epoxy parts mixed in-situ of the holes

to get this magnets stuck to the holes


and finally get this


Close up, the magnets totally encapsulated within the epoxy matrix


Pushed down as far as it goes, and use counter side magnets to apply constant force to be as flat as possible


So once the epoxy is properly hardened
the holes will be mill again to get the layer epoxy off and get as close to the magnet surface as possible

continue next post

What it would look like



tested to be able to hold onto the screw head with just enough force
while still maintaining ease to dissassembly

Screw stuck to the acrylic board






1. Front Panel
------a. Stick the magnet to the acrylic - [COLOR=red]Done[COLOR]
------a1. Drill holes for Power button
------b. Bend the top of the front panel
------c. Paint the FP or use sticker??

2. Side panel
------a. Paint or
------b. Apply tint layer + some design

3. The case
------a. Tear down braces
------b. Paint
------c. re-apply brace

4. Misc
------a. Buy New Cooler Heatsink
------b. Buy Fans
------c. Drill hole for extra drive slot at the bottom

then end with whole system assembly



The colour scheme in mind right now is something like the Koenigsegg orange + black scheme
something like this


the case would have the whole case (include internals painted brilliant orange
and the side panel be black

could go ferrari red

nothing is certain even at this stage...

Some micro updates
with some big results

Remember this piece?


anything off?

Then this ...


put 2 and 2 together
.....

you have 22... *cricket chirp*


Thank you, I will be here all week.

any way back to the picture,

The keen eyes would detect that the metal (test magnet)in the test acrylic board is gone
and the clump is what it has become, a clump of magnets.


Lucky I tested out on the test plate
*Remember guy, Measure x-time and cut once, here the "x" is >2, I prefer 5 times if permited


The idea is to mill the excess epoxy glue down to bare minimum
to get a flat face and to get maximum magnet strength
(just a tip, real magnets not like movie/cartoon magnets, every thickness in between will reduce the the pull force)
and somehow the magnet brittleness and maybe the cheap-er epoxy doesn't hold up to the mill process

So, it would be seems I have to use another way,
and the "crude" way


to get this


and this


and... this


So now the panel held on much more stronger and solid
no fear of falling off at mere touches

no ending
this is a "micro" updates anyway...


Addendum: Looking back, I would have use a more precise epoxy glue quantity to have it stick to the bottom and maybe the side as well
but there is a fear of not enough to hold the magnets properly

live and learn I guess

This post has been edited by mcchin: Dec 9 2014, 10:50 AM

Thanks for the encouragement

Here wee go again
another side project to derail this one

Jeng JENG JENG!!!!









Whzaat??? you say?

My phone casing modified with Note 2 Qi wireless charger receiver


Open up to reduce thickness


Then this is the Qi charging pad


the insides


The orange part



So basically a Phone holder for my Xperia Z with intergrated Qi wireless charging
Portrait mode okay, still need thinking on Landscape mode

The charge unit to be inserted into the 8mm acrylics ~2mm below surface

the back is the Heatsink to help with the heat dissipation

but the real idea here it to try bending the 8mm acrylic before trying out on the Front panel

Still, this phone stand is still in idea stage....

small info trickling in

big mess, but worth it!


Close up


Should be using this


but this one is not correct to work with


so in the end, use a big drill and grind to desired angle


THE RESULTS!!!


Chamfered edges which is the craze these days

Yes... yes
I trying my best...


Yesterday just done the final mass mill/drill/cut on the whole project

Will later get some pictures in

but now the final stretch is right around the corner

1. Bend the Front panel + take pictures
2. SPRAY!!!SPRAYY!!!!! SPRAYYY!!!! paint
---------> my worst enemey because a) i have no proper spray pain place and b) really bad in spray painting aka impatient

3. then assembly, which itself is a chore....

the place i intend to do spraying.....



sum live cables to hang the case for spray

This is the last drilling done....


the switch added in


now on the heater to heat + bend


and later with a hair dryer used tried to add more heat to the help with the bending...no luck
in the end have to crank from 5v to 12v on the PSU to heat up the board

Bang-Bang..




The whole thing


Here is the problem plaguing my whole life...


bad bend...like bad to the bones..... all because of impatient plus unknown properties of thicker acrylics

see the bad bends and the burnt mark from the overheat of high volts



Lucky for me, the original intention has been always to spray paint the front panel
so the irregulars can be sand paper before spray painting

more pic in the next post

more pictures gallery

Side profile of the unit


the side window itself weigh 1/3 of the empty case

Straight as I want it to be, angle just enough



The reason why I want to cover up the FP with paint

those 6 magnets didnt come out as I expected, but my expectation is very high here.

inside view


the view on the other side




still 1/4 of the way to go, the home strech...

1. Smoothen the FP bend and sand down the whole thing, prep-ing for Paint
2. Remove all braces, label and prep for paint
3. decals/ tint layer for side window
4. Additional accessory:
---------> a. edge rubbers
---------> b. extension wire/cables (Front USB, Power/Reset button, etc)
---------> c. Internal lighting (red or white?)
---------> d. A new CPU cooler
---------> e. Fans (2x140mm Front, 1x140mm Bottom)
---------> f. Cable managements system
---------> g. Wheels on the bottom for movement

Some item/planned ops that is dropped
1. Disassembly of RAM heatsink and repainting
2. Intergrated Qi wireless charging on the top

This post has been edited by mcchin: Dec 19 2014, 09:14 AM

Hi guys

sorry for the no show for almost two months

The whole project was intended to finished up before CNY (HAH!!!)

but CNY come too fast, and the best was to Clean up the current Open air setup ....

Then After CNY, too into holiday mood to start back anything

Chap goh meh come and gone... same, like somehow lost that feeling

Enter March, was no better, with ChingMing around the corner, taking up 3 weekends of the month

Now April, with my birthday past,
Its getting hard to find reasons for the delay

But Luckily!!
Rainy days!!!, recently been quite consistent in the evening for the weather to turn bad

and why would weather be any effect on what I do?

cause its the Point in the mod i dreaded the most,

Spray Painting................. .... ... .. .

any hooo,

rant over,
some pics in the next post
and see if i can start the rusty ol' engine this weekend

Here's how it sits,

1. Basic cut, drill, bend, file, riveting etc is all but completed
2. Assembly-wise, the Case "is" usable, forcefully but i choose not to
3. The dreaded Painting process awaits but...
4. Do I,
----> a: do a shoddy job and just paint the case just like that? or,
----> b: take apart every bracing on the case and paint it separately? or,
----> c: take apart everything, find a Powder coating and my wallet ... or,
----> d: just scrap the whole project and close this thread

what you guys think?

5. Place for me to paint is i choose to DIY painting is virtually nil, as been living in apartment


Some badly taken pics coming, all taken in the event to dismantle all braces before painting



the main back, T brace




The front mid, HDD cage brace




clearer picture




the back mid




the bottom braces, all you see is the rivets



bottom pic of the braces



bottom other side


all these pictures is showing nothing new
as I will maybe use to mark the braces with number to record the positions
as most probably the braces will not be painted over

so until the next update