The Filing Cabinet Server

Update time!

I managed to get the soldering done yesterday on the HSF, and will be doing more soldering as need be.

And I've started work on the armoring of the case as well. I see a lot of sanding in my future, but I'm going to cut all the pieces first and knock out the sanding all at once.

There's a few splinters missing on the two trapezoidal cut pieces, I might leave this as is, as it does give it a bit of a 'used and abused' look. Or I could just bust out the spot putty. Or go get some wood putty...

This is about ~15 minutes of cutting, so I should be able to make some progress tomorrow.

Also, I mentioned that I had borrowed a donor case. Here's a pic of it:

And finally, a box of goodies that still needs to be mailed out to Bopher. This woulda gotten sent off today, but the Post Office was PACKED. :( Oh well, I'll try again Wednesday!

Some major progress made: FCS is now a LAMP. :santa::banana::santa::banana:

Tomorrow, I shall migrate a few things off my 200 gig drive and install it along with an 80 gig that is currently residing in my NAS drive that is of no use to me.

Things are coming along nicely!

Keep the good work going!

Not that much of an update, but I'm seriously considering breaking down and buying a stationary belt sander from Sears. I made a post regarding flipping a portable belt sander upside down and clamping in a vise due to the high cost of stationary ones. Long story short, the stationary belt sander that I was originally looking at was an entry level professional belt sander, hence the high cost. It wasn't until I made a trip into the Craftsman section @ Sears that I realized the a hobby level belt sander is roughly a quarter of the price.

Also, I still need to get a shelf built in this bad boy to hold the cable modem, the router, and the switch box that is going to reside inside of it, or, in regards to the router, on top of it. I'm currently leaning towards either pegboard or MDF for the shelf. Either way, I will most likely need to add a couple more fans to the system for cooling purposes.

And the Sony screen that I procured, you ask? Scrapped for this project, however, it will either go into Frankenstripe or the John Deere mod. Or both, since I have two of them.

You see, I've got a deadline now. I want to get this and Frankenstripe done before the baby is here. I'd like to get Deere done as well, but I seriously do not think that will happen.

$99 at Sears. So I bought one.

I'm going to get the rest of the 'armor' cut over the next few days, and sanded most likely next weekend. I've also got the hardware for mounting the shelf on the inside. Expect a larger than normal post soon.

Update time--I spent a couple hours over the weekend cutting and sanding and cutting and sanding and...well you get the idea. Then I busted out my glue gun and the top of the FCS now looks like:

I took this before I glued everything down, I'll get some better pics up soon.

Here's what I've got left to do for construction:

Install shelf inside (have parts)
Cut new airflow holes (one for shelf area, one for computer area)
Buy two more 120mm fans
Continue motif down the right and left sides
Trim motif around holes, mainly to cover up the Hugh Jass mistake I made on the original intake hole
Resize PSU slot on back
Scratcbuild and install button panel (have parts, need to get it done
Install HD cage
Buy and install green CCFLs, reroute switch to plate cover (already purchased the cover, need to get the CCFLs this week I'm thinking)
Front door design
Wire management
Paint

It looks like a big list, but the majority of the work will be done on the right and left sides with the motif, followed by the front door. I've got two ideas kicking around in my head at the moment, both of which were inspired by mods here--TIP 3K and Tranquility.

And in other news, my Aerocool M40 case is going to be here any minute. The server is getting transplanted again, as I need a MicroATX board for installation review purposes.

This one's in my sights as well. I've scrapped the Mashie inspiration in favor of some trick painting, a la Commando.

Work to resume next week.

Oooooohhhhh... what'cha got in mind for paint? huh? huh? huh? Lookin good man. Have some rep. Let me know if you need help on that LAMP at all.

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Originally Posted by SgtM

Oooooohhhhh... what'cha got in mind for paint? huh? huh? huh? Lookin good man. Have some rep. Let me know if you need help on that LAMP at all.

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The LAMP is rock ****ing solid. Biggest issue I'm facing at the moment with it concerns how I've got it connecting to my home network--wireless card, and every time I turn it on, I have to type in the password to connect, which kinda defeats the whole purpose of having it headless. It's Ubuntu 7.something, I might blow it away and put 8 on there instead. But that's down the road a ways.

The other issue I'm having is in regards to streaming video, I'm thinking that the ol' PIII ain't up for it, network congestion, or a combination of both. Once this build is done, I'll get cracking on the fine tuning of the home network--been looking into some 3rd party ROM flashes for the router.

Paint wise, I'm thinking waterdrops. Simple to do, and looks badassed.

Yes, I know. I've been promising updates for what, the last YEAR?!? And I really haven't delivered. That's going to change tomorrow. I've got the next two off, everything I need I already have (sans the paint, but it too freaking hot right now, lest I lay paint @ 3 am, and that just ain't gonna cut it), so there's really no excuse whatsoever right?

One minor update to add as well--I've pulled the 200 gig hard drive and put it on blue for the time being for storage purposes. The Mrs. and I are looking at a house out in the 'burbs (if you can call Slum Prairie...errr Sun Prairie the 'burbs of Great Falls) that has an absolutely huge 3 car garage (the single car portion is partitioned off from the double bay door--guess where the CLIMATE CONTROLLED shop is?!?!?!?) that's well within our price range, and if this goes through, I will feasibly be able to mod year around, with minimum issues concerning dust (it's that well insulated and whatnot) for when I'm throwing down paint. I'm still shooting for a complete hardware update on the FCS, or (more probable) just transplanting hardware if and when I decide to upgrade Frankenstripe/Blue.

Pics coming tomorrow. Most likely bare metal, with the slight chance of primer. Ditto Frank. I'll be a painting madman as soon as the sun goes down.

Very minor progress to report--cleaning the paint off the back panel of Frank took a bit longer than I thought it would.

Forgive the ****ty pics, I forgot to grab my camera and had to take these with the cell phone. If I would of had another hour, I would have been at bare metal and been ready to prime. This is roughly 20 minutes worth of stripping with my drill. Yes, I could go get some paint stripper, but I find that using a stripping bit is much more therapeutic.

More coming tomorrow. As you can see, I've ripped this thing down completely. I'll hopefully get the MDF bottom drilled and painted.

And the paint scheme is gonna kick all sorts of ass. You'll just have to wait and see.

cool


a drill ??? never heard that one before nice workk

My dad was striping the paint off of the keel on his old boat with a drill, until he got paint stripper. For my case, I just used a palm sander.

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Originally Posted by DonT-FeaR

cool


a drill ??? never heard that one before nice workk

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If you look at the first picture, you can see my stripping bits in the lower right hand corner.

It's a bit time consuming, especially if the work area is on the large side. But also very stress relieving.

I think I need me a few of those. All I been using is sanding disks on a drill. gives you funky swirls that have to be sanded out anyway by hand.

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Originally Posted by Bopher

I think I need me a few of those. All I been using is sanding disks on a drill. gives you funky swirls that have to be sanded out anyway by hand.

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I still get a few funky shapes, especially with the metal one. I'll be going over all this with most likely 600 grit before primering.

Block sanding...oh joy. But hey, paint jobs are very dependent on prep work, so I'll do what I gotta do.

oh right yea idk what i was thinking about lol

Quote:

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Originally Posted by DrumThumper

Until then, I will be tearing Blue apart and canabalizing the 200 gig HD out of it and using it in conjunction with 2 80 gig HDs for a total of 360 gigs plus whatever isn't being used by my 4 gig (yes, that is correct, a 4 gig hard drive) by FreeNAS.

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is anything under 100 gig even legal anymore :? :D

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Originally Posted by SXRguyinMA

is anything under 100 gig even legal anymore :? :D

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Hehe. I've got quite the collection of ancient gear. I think I still have the hard drive out of my first computer, and it only held 180 megs IIRC.

Following up from the previous post:

Two of the three sides done. I'll probably go over the front as well--or just hit it with some 600 grit and paint over it.

And some commentary from yours truly:



I would have gotten the third side done, but 8 hours of work + 45 minutes of sanding = jello arms. I'll bust out the third side tomorrow and, depending on next week's work schedule, there's a good chance I'll get the priming done on this and the rest of Frank. Speaking of Frank, I've got a bit of work to do with the lighting on the bottom--intermittent flashing, and I know where the problem is, so I'll be doing some rewiring. Then I gotta figure out where and how to hook up the white LEDs inside the case.

cool

One hell of a solid case fabrication. +Rep
Looks like it was defiantly worth the hard work and effort.
Interested to see what you do next.

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Originally Posted by Eclecticos

One hell of a solid case fabrication. +Rep
Looks like it was defiantly worth the hard work and effort.
Interested to see what you do next.

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More stripping tonight, and possibly laying down primer. And I've been digging around in modder's pile and I've got a few other ideas that might see the light of day as well.

Once I get to actually laying paint down, I think you guys are gonna dig what I've got in store. I'll post a youtube link to where I got the idea from along with pics of my version.

Once again, my apologies for the crappy pics:

One side done

And I'm now out of primer. It's 12:30 am here, so I will call it a night. Got the whole thing sans the small parts on the front sanded and primered, so I'll get some more primer, finish that up, and primer all the parts for Frank as well tomorrow. I'm also planning on finally getting the shelving installed tomorrow too, along with fixing the PSU area. Will most likely knock a hole out on the top part as well for cabling management.

hmmm red primer

interesting


looks good now finish it off :)

Quote:

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Originally Posted by DonT-FeaR

hmmm red primer

interesting


looks good now finish it off :)

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The can says "Ruddy Brown", but yeah, its red hued. Today I'll be working till 1 am (ugh) and just remembered that the Mrs. has a doctor's appt early in the morning. So I'll just be buying 1 more can of primer and some paint for the base color. If I get a chance tomorrow morning after the appt, I'll get the shelf built. I'd go do it right now, but as of late, once I start modding I don't want to stop, and since I've got both cases at my disposal...I'm not going to take that chance--too much to do before work.

I'll be sure to grab the good camera as well.

Looking good. Given any though about using some sound deadening inside? My custom case is roughly the same size. I used FATMAT, the stuff they use on car floorboards. No vibrations. Made the thin panels feel solid.

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Originally Posted by moon111

Looking good. Given any though about using some sound deadening inside? My custom case is roughly the same size. I used FATMAT, the stuff they use on car floorboards. No vibrations. Made the thin panels feel solid.

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I really haven't given any thought to it. Now I'll have to go look into it. Thanks for looking!

So, I've been jabbering on constantly about the paint scheme for this beast of a case. SgtM turned me onto this dude named Ed Hubbs, and he's got a ton of instructional videos on Youtube. So, after watching the one titled "Wrinkle Effect", I decided to see if it would work with spraypaints:

This is actually the floor of the FCS, I figured it would make the perfect test piece, just in case something went horribly wrong. As you can see, it came out freaking nice.

I'm still working out the overall design for putting the wrinkle effect on FCS.

Now that is cool. Looking good man.

OMFG thats cool nice painting

Pics do not do this part justice. This back panel is not for this build, but I needed a test bed of sorts to try this out--this is going to be the second half of the paint job:

It's waterdrop, and it is very subtle. I've got three coats of rattle can clear on right now, and will be wetsanding tomorrow. I just might take the cover off my jukebox and paint the top like this in the future.

Edit: Video time!



Thanks to Commando for the tutorial.

Lookin sweet dude! +rep

true that sgtM i love the paint

Awesome paint work! I've never managed to come close to that intentionally... but I've accidentally made some neat stuff. Not on par with that, though. +rep

And I am two steps closer to calling this one done. All I've got left to do is:

HD rack
Optical drive mount (figured out, just need to buy the parts)
finish painting
a small bit of filing

Remember that tiny little hole in the back, from back when I decided I was going to stealth the PSU? Suffice to say, it's gone:

So, having knocked that out, I decided to hit the case with some wet 320 grit sandpaper, and follow that up with some mineral spirits.

Then, the fun began:

And that is where I am currently at. Will be wetsanding again tomorrow, followed by another coat of paint. Then, to borrow a term from the auto painting industry, an "inter-coat clear" layer will go down, followed by frisket paper. After that, it's off to a co-worker who's quite the artist--he's gonna draw some flames for me. I'll cut the flames out, wrinkle effect it, pull the other side of the frisket off, remask and do waterdrops on the other side.

And the goal is to have this done within a week. I think that is easily obtainable.

the black looks nice

You've seen what I've planned. It is now coming together.

Sorry for the fuzzyness on a few of these--I've been messing around with my camera a bit too.


Next up, an intercoat clear over the whole thing and frisket paper.

Three more pics--I personally like the second one.

Carbon fiber has been added:

Still have to do the other side. And I'm planning on doing this with the door as well.