Thats a great looking color and nicely applied :)
Gonna be a kicker to see this thing fully assembled and fired up, good job !!!
This front bezel looks better and cleaner than the previous one.
Printable View
Thats a great looking color and nicely applied :)
Gonna be a kicker to see this thing fully assembled and fired up, good job !!!
This front bezel looks better and cleaner than the previous one.
Thanks for your comments again cellsite60, appreciated :).
And here we go, last pictures on this case I believe, borrowed a slightly better camera for these, woo hoo :) :banana:.
On this one my new 5870 peeks over :).
Was well worth re attempting the front :banana::banana::banana:.
Looking good.
Nice and clean :)
definitely nice... and i must say an improvement over the first one.... great job
the stages of a good build... plan plan plan - prototype - rebuild lol
Thanks again cellsite60 :).
LiTHiUM0XiD3, thanks, and the stages of a good build lol :D
blueonblack was absolutely right about the grills adding to noise though, must have added a good 5db on top of the plain holes to the case, Tried tollerating the noise difference for a couple of hours and didn't like it much :), too used to it being nice & quiet, so I went & dug out my old zalman zm mfc1 + fan controller and hooked all the front panel & side fans to it & lowered the speed a little and it's now the same noise as it were with plain circles while keeping a good flow of air going through, was considering doing volt mods but figured it be easier and cleaner just to use a fan controller, it's hidden inside the case and can catch some air flow so it shouldn't overheat and fail. Side effect of this is temps have gone up by 3c but thats not bad.
The spiral type grills are more restrictive than the ones in the middle so I can run the middle ones a bit faster than the spiral ones and noise stays the same so it's worked out good :).
Also fixed the top problem I had with it not sitting flush :banana:, I should probably replace the pictures.
Definately last pictures now because I fixed the top and to show the fan controller.
I bought some 10mm spacers and rubber washers to put between the front panel & fans so I could put the fan controller back in the box of parts and it really helped cut the extra noise from the air restriction, so back to decent temps and normal noise :banana:.
Can't really call this a new project, more of a part 2 :), I wanted a nice new unit for my consoles, pc & favourite games/dvds to be all in 1 space saving stack, had quite a few redesigns & settled for this one, seems my modding has overspilled into making furniture :D.
It's going to be a stand for the air cube on top, ps3 level below with great ventilation, a level below for my xbox 360, dvd storage below on the bottom 2 levels on both sides with a psu sat in the middle of level 2 for powering the xbox 360 & fans with room for control pads inbetween the dvds.
I'm also working on a new top & rear panel for the xbox 360 to accommodate for better cooling replacing the gpu heatsink for a 360 cpu heatsink & placing bga coolers on all chips with 120mm fan intake & exhaust & dvd drive relocation :).
This aluminium was for redoing the corners & bottom sides & back panel.
When doing my design over & over I figured I dont have to re do the corners & bottom sides but I still have good use for the sheet to reorientate the back panel a little, so the angle bars in this picture are not needed for the build, had a slight redesign after I made the order.
Here is the right side panel botch shots, they will be covered by the chunky angle bars that hold the air cube in place, this mod has spawned from the botched corners & price of delivery not being worth just doing the air cube.
This is the aluminium for the new build, I beleive if the frame is good & strong then there is no true need for expensive thick sheet, especially for what I'm making.
I was sat on this aluminium for over a week which is a 1st, I usually can't wait but I wanted to do this properly, I needed a tool for doing clean bar cuts at 45 degrees & 90 degrees.
Missed out on a bargain for a really good cut off saw at £100 it was worth £300 but because of very low money I had to get a much cheaper alternative, a manual cheapish £30 mitre saw, the build would have gone tragically wrong if I didn't :D.
Should have been 1 of the 1st tools I added to my collection when working with aluminium bars, it's proven to be a very awesome tool for this build :).
Finally the work begins woo hoo :D.
Friday
Got the angle bars for all levels cut to size, all 45 degree cuts.
Saturday
Got loads more cut to size, not much more to do other than a few more bars (but the thicker ones) & 6 thin sheets.
This is 1 of the basic levels
Got all bars cut to size today except for the main corner angle bars, want to get everything correct before I do them, so I'm just working on making the levels 1st.
Did a loose fit of all the levels & they are great, the bottom panel will be ultra strong, it looked pretty reasonable in google sketchup but in reality it does look a bit overkill, nonetheless it will be very strong indeed lol :D.
More updates soon :)
Ummmmm... wow. I think you could use that as a base for a transmission dolly. Nice.Quote:
Originally Posted by Waynio
+ rep for the overki... uh, functionality.
:) Thanks blue lol.
I got all the sheets cut to size today & made the new back panel, all was going very good until I attempted to do the mesh again, I failed miserably, didn't space them out enough so it was starting to look awful, should have stopped as soon as I seen the marks were too close, I will work a different vent into it, not to worry :), I'll up the pictures when I have a decent fix, design time for the rest of today & more dremel time tomorrow :D.
That rack is looking really awesome, I can't wait to see it come together.
Cheers Jase, it's been on hold the past 3 days so I can get the rear aircube panel redone, heres the update on that.
Oh no's, done the spacing wrong by 3mm for the mesh, should have been every 9 or 10mm, should have stopped after the 1st hole & remade the grid to follow, but no I ended up with this & thinking I'd have to buy another sheet.
My dremel has been dying slowly lately & has now become useless, it was getting lateish so couldn't use the air dremel (very noisy) so I made a quick alternative for the design & drilled within the areas I wanted cutting out & done a ton of filing, even used a hacksaw blade pushing & pulling through the area to get it done lol, was thinking it's just too rough looking but carried on anyway, it could still use a little more smoothing out here & there but I think it's turned out not so bad, what do you all think?.
Be able to get back to the stack soon :banana:.
If it's any consolation, I think the new grill does look very interesting.
Thanks for feeback jase :up:.
This update covers the last few days.
With my dremel being useless now & the reinforced cutting discs having the wrong sized hole 1/8" making it a hassle to change discs because they also need aligning, I tried this other cutting air tool but couldn't see where I was cutting so put it away, this picture shows the new right side window & grill for the psu & also the 3mm higher motherboard tray, the flat bars are a temporary loose fix at the moment, they will be attached properly when it's time.
This shows the washers & 10mm spacers I used to cut down the noise from the restrictive front grills, I realised I only mentioned it in the log so heres a picture :).
I can get to work on a few other things while waiting for stuff to come, the new cooling & top & back for the xbox 360, the ps3 stand, paint the fans, trim the back panel & smooth out any rough spots & get it painted, so no excuse for not getting something done while I wait :).
Getting the feet off the air cube might be tough because I used araldite which sets like stone, it was the feet that introduced a little wonkyness to the case, seems it's sat correct on the right side & not on the left which is why there was a gap on the top left, can picture myself having to hammer & chissel them off so I can tap a solid bar for a good fit to existing bolts coming through the bottom.
I decided to do the xbox today, made a good bit of progress, spent near 12 hours on it, figured I'd keep the gpu heatsink so it will be about 130mm at it's highest point, got the basic functionality sorted on it, just need to make a nice cover for it all then the xbox is ready for painting, got the tap & tap wrench & it works a treat, used it for the rear fan mount, holds it nice & firm :), this was a rrod xbox I bought & fixed it had a 0020 error code & figured the only way it will stay fixed is if I boost the cooling, all of the long screws still have their place but I'm thinking of loosing the middle back one so I can create a duct for the rear fan, as you can see it's half in & half out. Ha, it just dawned on me while looking at the picture that I'll probably have to make a new hold down strip else it might not close, doh! :D.
More soon :).
Love the Xbox hacking :D, I can't wait to see more.
:D Well here you go then, man I'm knackered lol, it's worth it though :).
Didn't get much done yesterday or today as the sun was too tempting to miss after a long winter :D.
Got the rear fan properly secured down while the xbox was properly closed, filed the corner supports of the rear fan so the strip of metal would fit closely for it to be well in place.
On this back shot I plan to get rid of all the internal mesh, fill in all the plastic mesh & create a nice hole for fan wires to come through & a little cut to size strip bent to get rid of the gap from the fan to the plastic xbox case so it doesn't look rough, I'm also going to fill in the dvd slot hole & keep the eject button functional, waiting for some velcro tape to secure the dvd drive down which will reduce dvd vibration, the actual dvd tray will be stealthed also.
Measured, marked & placed little angle bars in place & riveted them to the xbox shell & tapped a hole on them ready for fixing a cover which I'm still thinking about best way to do it.
Thought I'd try & make a 1 piece cover, 1st try at using my cut to smaller pieces steel flat bar from my 1st metal bender, tripple checked the required measurements & marked the sheet, ready for cutting the corners out, it's really a pretty good cheap method for cutting sheet metal, think I'll use this method quite often :)
Human jigsaw lol :D.
This is a shot with the cut up steel bar from my previous sheet metal bender, they are cut to size for making back pci/io pieces, still not tried making my own yet though.
Going good so far.
Woo hoo :D :banana:.
The edges will be smoothed & closed together, I just had enough for the day lol.
1 tiny detail I forgot to think about is the right side clip on piece, 1 of the upper slots will not be able to slot in, but I'll work something out for that & luckily it's not the important hdd side :).
More soon :up:.
Probably the beefiest Xbox I have ever seen lol, nice work mate.
Didn't get anything done from tuesday to friday, here's why.
To keep this bit light hearted I'll just say my bro messed up badly again, I needed some time to brighten up after this latest do, seems he'll never learn that legal highs are just plain bad for him, I'm losing count how many times he has come close to death now & they could be & probably are laced with toxic crap. It's been hard keeping bright when he plays up like this, but spring is definately helping with some nice blue skys & sunshine, long grey winters make you really appreciate a nice blue sky & some warmth :).
I have come to a firm conclusion that many people who say they are bored should rephrase it to I'm a boring person, time to change lol :D.
Right, now my excuse for no updates is out of the way, onwards with the project woo hoo :banana:.
:D Thanks Jase, yeah it's nearly double height lol.
I have tried out the upgraded cooling on the 360 without the casings though within that time, main 2 fans blowing on the components, rear fan pulling air out, played some gta iv for 10 minutes, turned off put my hand on the gpu heatsink, was nice & cool :), did same on cpu & it was very hot to touch.
So I flipped the cpu fan over to take air away from it & had the rear fan blowing in, both gpu & cpu run nice & cool to the touch after half an hour of gta iv mayhem :D so I'll make a duct to guide air out of the side & put an easy to remove & clean dust filter on the back to minimise the need for clean outs.
So it's looking like a very good anti rrod fix so far :), concernig the cooling layout it's a good thing I had a little downtime else it would have been done wrong, I'll take the 2 temperature sensors from my 1st 360 mod & place them on this new mod so I will be able to see if the fans start failing + it might make it look a little better :).
I would do a cooling mod on my new ps3 but it is still under warranty so that is why I'm just doing a ventalation mod outside of it which I hope will be enough for it's longevity, it does get pretty warm sat on a desk but a good flow of air passing above & below it should help.
Here's what I got done over the weekend, should be back on track with regular progress from now :).
The 360 is coming along ok :).
Whilst I was without a dremel, I started drilling, filing & sawing to get things done, silly me I tried the same technique for the air cube right side panel & ended up putting it aside until my cutting discs with the correct 1/16" hole in the middle arrived.
Well, got the cutting discs :), I cut along the lines I marked out perfectly, filed & sanded all the edges, thought jobs a gooden, pulled all the masking tape off & the drill holes left a bit of a mess on the psu grill, yes it could have been patched up with body filler but I prefer not to use it so I filed away settling for some wonky lines instead, I'll mask around the grill & give it a quick spray of matisse blue & spray some into a pot & use a fine brush to do all the bare edges.
The other window will be removed so I can get the white double sided mounting tape cleaned off & replaced with clear mounting tape.
Thats all for now, more soon :).
Ahh, think I'm coming together again, a few said I should do a scratch build 360 case, I had pretty firm plans on just modding the 360 with scraps I had lying around to keep it's original functionality & to cost nothing other than the fans, the last week I just didn't know how to carry on (head was scrambled) so kept putting it off, so I sat down & started designing a completely custom 360 case, kept my mind busy for hours & it seems to have done the trick to get me back in the mood for continuing, had to get some new body filler (the activator had burst out of it's tube & become useless while in storage), wanted to carry on for hours more but had to call it a day though because of noisy filing, don't want to irritate any neighbors in the evening with my hobby :).
The back side is coming together, cut out the internal mesh, used little pieces of sheet aluminium held on the inside of the exterior mesh & filled over the holes & sanded down, have made the filler strip template but can't do it until tomorrow (the air dremel is noisy) & had some more filing to do on the internal metal chassis which resonates a loud racket, so I hope to get all the body work & air ducts done tomorrow, then I can put it aside until I paint it & can continue with the stack, woo hoo I found my mojo baby, yeahh :D lol.
I'm feeling good again so more soon :).
Lol, I thought I'd get all the xbox body work done today :facepalm:, but only got the front gap between the metal cover & xbox filled & sanded & made the gap cover at the back, still, it's steady progress :), it looks like there is a gap still but that is just perm marker from a guide I made on the filler to form a nice smooth edge, used 60 grit, 240, 600 sand paper.
Needed a bit more filler.
I don't know when the body work will be fully done on this xbox, could be tomorrow or the day after if I keep at it like the past couple of days.
I'll just keep posting at the end of the day when any progress happens :).
Only done the face plate today (started too late), I trimmed the original dvd bezel so it was 1 or 2mm thick, placed maksking tape over the front of the face plate, lay the trimmed bezel in place & slapped some body filler over it, sanded, then flipped it over & covered the gaps for the bezel & sanded smooth.
The top piece is going to need a bit of work on it before it looks a bit nicer but it'll come together, just had a slack day lol :D.
More soon :).
Xbox 360
Filled & sanded the inside & outside corners of the top piece.
Made a quick & simple air duct to blow out of the side, still undecided if the rear fan will bring air in or out.
The back could do with some filler so it all sits nice & flat all around, I'll get that done tomorrow, I'll also trim the flat bars out of the way of the side hole.
It's getting very close to being ready for painting :).
Air cube
LOL, the temps are better with the exterior panels on rather than off :D, just thought I'd take a pic of the air cube with the new panel on :), the onboard led lights only come on when starting up the pc & are quite subtle but good looking, I like them, there is a green, orange & red light which has given me an idea to use some leds on both sides of the case to be different colours, the 5870 pretty much splits the case into 2 halves so I think it'll look quite decent if placed in the right spots.
More soon :).
The work on the Xbox is comming along nicely. I like the disk drive relocation.
Sure is Jase, the dvd cables just about reach :D, nearly got this xbox done now, phew :).
Put a good layer of filler on the back & smoothed out, the top piece is laid flat now & cut the flat bars lower to be unseen.
Decided ac ryan meshx is the right stuff for the side duct hole, it's very unrestrictive so would be perfect for it, thought about doing my own grill but the meshx would be better, once I have a mesh sorted for the hole it should be ready for painting & then I can move on with the stack, after a couple of days for a break :).
Doing the xbox the way I have has given me more appreciation for case mods, scratch builds are more straight forward because you are the one who designed it so you know exactly how it should all go together, it requires a lot of adapting with a ready made case so I believe it can take just as much effort to do a good looking mod, case mod appreciation +10 :D.
The ps3 is going to look too normal amongst the 360 & air cube, I'd love to at least give it a paint job but that warranty is stopping me, for now :D.
More soon, Can't do nothing more on the xbox until tuesday but I could make a start on the levels of the stack if I feel up for it.
Wow, that's some awesome metal work! Everything all snuggly fit. Good job, can't wait till this is done! :D
I think the AC Ryan MeshX will go very well with the mod. I have used the stuff before and must saw it is very easy to work with, you can cut the stuff quite easily with tin snips and it bends like a dream.
Thank you Xtrykr, just waiting for the mesh, should have it tomorrow, then fix it to the 360, then clean, then paint :).
:) I should have some tin snips but never got around to buying some, I'm friends with the air dremel again now I have the correct fitting discs lol :D, still got to order the paint for the xbox.
The stack.
The makeshift table was not flat enough for putting a jig on & getting this stack made, luckily my dad had a kitchen work top doing nothing, so we took the clamping piece off the rough makeshift table & put it on the kitchen top, so now I have a nice table to work on :).
Made a square jig, I cut the wood to precise sizes of the angle bars so I needed 4 hands to make it 100% square, my dad helped me on this, it would have taken ages to do on my own & might not have been 100% square, anyway the jig is perfect so I'll be able to do my marking spot on when I start on this stack.
This is the bottom level piece, it's the chunkiest level of them all, I wanted it to be well grounded :).
More soon :).
Decided to do the part I was dreading the most, removing the air cubes feet which I stuck on with araldite.
I removed the araldite by using my heat gun on all the exposed bits for a few seconds & then scraped it off, then heated the whole bar & levered it off, it all went nice & smoothly :).
Polished up the original polish so it looks all fresh again :).
With the old feet taken off the sides & top fit perfect.
cut, filed & polished some new ones from solid square aluminium bar & decided to use mounting tape to attach the new feet.
With the new feet on the sides & top fit perfect, so glad :D.
Looks pretty sweet :).
Finally cleared up the garage so it isn't like a game of twister any more, it was getting ridiculas lol :D.
Got the ac ryan meshx, got it installed on the xbox (used my glue gun), where the rivets are hanging out I want to tap the holes so it is properly secured in place & so it can be disassembled easy, once I get that done it is time for painting it.
More soon :).
Time to sort the ugly brown & green fans out, the fan blades pop off easily.
I looked around the house for something that could quickly cover the fans motors & found spice jar covers to be a perfect fit :).
Primer
Shot to show the spice covers doing their job :).
I cut a load of circles from card board & stuck the sharp end of a rivet through the centre & popped them onto the fan blade.
The fan blade colour was not as light as I was hoping, originally wanted a close to white ice blue so this is way off that plan but I'll settle for it, not putting more paint on the blades, anyway, much better than brown/green, got the frame colour exactly how I wanted it at least.
Now, I need to make my mind up if I'm going to paint the internal panels or not, & if I am what colour, so I'll put that bit off until I'm sure.
I'll take some better pictures of the fans when I have some good daylight.
better? they're impressive now! ^__^
The fans look so much better now that they are painted. So so much better.
:banana: Thanks StormRider :D.Quote:
Originally Posted by StormRider
:D Thanks Jase.Quote:
Originally Posted by The boy 4rm oz
This is how how my pc has been the past few days while I've been painting, had it functioning purely for media & internet.
Spent a bit of time sanding all the work on the back panel & it's all nice & smooth now, painted both sides too.
The front panel needed the countersinks to be a little deeper so the bolts sit flush, painted the rear of the panel too.
Painted the back expansion/io piece.
Here is a better shot of the hdd cage I made, the ssd can slip in the top space just perfect :).
The blue gigabyte motherboard goes really well with the fans & back panel & the braided cables you can see are extensions (got them for pcie, 8 pin atx, main atx, I would rather buy them like that than void my warranty, especially with a decent psu (they cost too much to void them), the sata cables could do with being swapped out or even braided, I would love to shorten the psu cables because they are way too long but I can tidy them into the front right corner just about, got rid of the rounded ide cable, it is supposed to be clear but it had turned nicoteenish lol, the flat ide cable routes better anyway.
withgpu
I think the back looks better than the front now lol :D.
Everything is done on the front, back & insides, I'm going to come up with an alternative for the right side grill, either make the bars slimmer or get another sheet, then all thats needed is the left window removing to clean up the white mounting tape & replace with clear mounting tape, then the air cube v2 is complete, still waiting for my drill bits to arrive before I can do anything else on the xbox & the stack, so I'm having a few days off from it :).
looking good!
I'd rob a bank(or two) for that case:devious:
well, not really, but you get the idea:D
The painted fans really finish off the mod perfectly, it looks so much better now then it did with the fans their original colour. Everything just blends in together, makes it look like it all belongs together.
Outstanding work! +rep
Thanks billygoat333 :).Quote:
Originally Posted by billygoat333
Thanks StormRider :D.Quote:
Originally Posted by StormRider
Thanks Jase :up:.Quote:
Originally Posted by The boy 4rm oz
Thank you blue :), woohoo I've gone up another notch :banana:.Quote:
Originally Posted by blueonblack
In other news the air compressor is playing up, it's getting up to 50 psi & not going any higher & keeps running rather than switching off, doesn't look good, most of the air tools I have need up to 90 psi the compressor could go up to 150 psi until the other day :(, hopefully it is a simple inexpensive fix.
My dad went to a motorbike show the other day & came back with a few nice new air tools so this is a bit gutting, a sawzel & a belt sander.
I managed to clean all the dust out of the case & psu with it, it was while I was doing the dusting I noticed a change in the noise of the motor, I have really taken a shine to air tools now so I'll have to get it fixed :up:.
I ordered some small light changing LED boxes for the air cube :D.
Called Lamptron Psycho Lazer LEDs :D.
Ughh, 1st the air compressor, now my tap snapped & got stuck.
Got the fan frame for the xbox properly mounted to the chassis now, tapped it earlier so it's ready for painting, nothing new visually so I'll post pics when it's painted.
I made a start on the stack today, marked up where to drill, drilled all the mounting holes for the bottom level & was going very good, maybe too good lol something bad had to happen & it did.
Ran into a problem while tapping the final layer of the base of the stack, the tap snapped off while doing 1 of the holes, can't remove it at all, tried all known methods, just nothing to grip hold of, so my best bet is to file down the parts that stick out & relocate the hole & body fill over the failed hole or redesign the base a bit, ahh the joys of modding lol :D, it's all worth the effort in the end though :). Anyway, the stack is back on hold until I get a couple of new taps :hurt:.
Looking forward to installing the LED's in the right spots tomorrow though :).
I don't think I'll be using the LED blocks, they really are awful, on the video it shows them changing slowly, the ones I got change far too fast & then strobe, straight away I found them highly irritating lol, I should have just learned how to do my own LED lighting, would have been cheaper & far better, I have soldering irons & am pretty good at solder work, I just got lazy lol.
