Lean and Green - modular dual PC scratch build

42 days left if including today, need to push harder. :D

Micro update but it's an update.

I cut 4 little pieces of the same aluminium I used for the hdd trays to make spacers for while I stick them together, the adhesive does it's initial setting fairly quick so I managed OK with just 4 pieces to do the spacing, would have been easier with 6 more but I didn't fancy cutting more, I need a new band saw blade, current ones are well past useful & was not nice at all to cut with.

Upper & lower hdd slide rack.

Fan perch stuck together, weighted down & is almost 20mm thick, I'll cut the shape, slim it down to 19mm & on next session get these parts mounted.

42 days sounds like a fair bit of time but it soon comes & goes especially if you goof off playing games & have some AFK to slow you down. :D

Tweaked my camera sharpness & contrast settings a little too & picked up some good photography tips from Paul Tan but none of the lighting tips will be used until I'm past the main workshop stuff.

40 days left since it's just crept past midnight. :D

OK the HDD slide panels have cured for a while, you can see here the holes that need completing.

Completing the holes.

Then I had to dismantle some of the HTPC to get to the level on top of the optical section for adding a few mounting holes.

Was tricky to align this template spot on, new holes & the ones the drill bit is pointing at was tapped, all the rest was countersunk.

Back to the acrylic & placed brass inserts in the holes.

Pressed in with soldering iron.

Reassembled & had to take about 2mm off the width of all the HDD trays so they would fit in, I also mounted spare HDD's & an SSD to them to see how it looks.

Full.

I'll do more today after a sleep & some food. :D

Thats nice!

I love your style!

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Originally Posted by Fuganater

Thats nice!

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Thanks Fuga :up: they slide in/out nicely. :)

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Originally Posted by jdbnsn

I love your style!

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:D:up: Thanks jd :)

HTPC Fan perch 20mm 4 5mm layers glued together.

Basic first cuts.

Used the modded band saw blade but it was causing it to melt when doing the smaller curve cuts, the blade got completely stuck in there.
Had to saw to the blade & file to the blade to free it, those curves are ones that will be visible too so I had a big drum sanding session to clean them up, was a PITA. :D

Used a sturdy fret saw blade for doing the bigger curve & did it very slow going forward 3 millimetres & going back about 6 over & over & it prevented it from melting, also did that on half speed instead of the slowest, worked a lot better. :)

Installed brass inserts to the fan perch.

Filed the optical plate to represent where I need to round the corners.

Used the hack saw to cut down 7mm so its down to 3mm.

Put it in the cross vice & set it up to drill down so 3mm would be left to make filing a little easier.

My arms got Popeyed ugugugugug. :D

Aluminium shortbread.

I filed down far enough to let me finish it off with a mill bit in the drill press & cross vice, it worked quite nicely really.

Smoothed things off more with a file.

Cut the optical tray out.

Installed.

Optical plate & fan perch installed.

That turned out to be a big session but was one of those where I just wouldn't call it a day until I got what I intended to do done, I'll make my next session a small one to balance things out again. :D

Drive bay will be nice but I think you should have went with a slot load. Would have look much cleaner for this build.

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Originally Posted by Fuganater

Drive bay will be nice but I think you should have went with a slot load. Would have look much cleaner for this build.

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Know what you mean but I prefer full speed optical when I need to use optical but not aesthetically but I'd rather have the good function & cheaper price full size gives :) some thought the optical on stealthlow was a slim one & some didn’t even know it was an optical drive until I pressed eject, plus I've not designed the tray cover for this one yet. :D

Was going to switch from optical media to HDD’s for backing my media collection up & use a good external optical drive whenever I need one but just as I was going to the floods hit the HDD factory & the prices shot up crazily high & I wasn’t willing to pay that much for something that is no different than normal HDD’s, prices have come down but still not as awesomely cheap as they were & they have shorter warranty's now also but I will try to cram in 4 3TB HDD's into the HTPC as the final storage but my current drives will do until I raise the money for them. :D

For an SSD on the gaming rig I'm unsure about putting the latest firmware for the corsair force 3, it was driving me mad with completely random BSOD's & it happened when I was almost done on a new design & knackered my OS but thanks to Linux on a usb flash drive I managed to salvage a good chunk of it so because of that I highly value stability on SSD's more than speed, Samsung 830s look great to me, I know they have released 840 series but they are more expensive & have slower writes. :)

I'll have a go at doing the first custom fan next. :up:

I'm still all about the Curcial M4 series. I have several 128GB ones and I'm thinking about getting 1 or 2 256/512GB ones.

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Originally Posted by Fuganater

I'm still all about the Curcial M4 series. I have several 128GB ones and I'm thinking about getting 1 or 2 256/512GB ones.

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Good drives from what I hear or read rather. :D:up:

Great work, your devotion and patience on that scroll saw deserves a medal :bowdown: +rep

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Originally Posted by Beta-brain

Great work, your devotion and patience on that scroll saw deserves a medal :bowdown: +rep

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:D Thanks Beta :):up:

Planning, lots of extra planning. :D

Pedestal
Pricing of MDF & plywood at local DIY stores is a bad joke unfortunately.

18mmx1220x2440mm MDF £18 or plywood £29 but I'd need a big van to transport it, this 1 piece covers what I need so this is an annoyance plus I'd rather use 25mm thick but they don't offer it.

6x 18mmx1220x606 £93 in MDF at £15.50 each & £221 in plywood at £36.82 each, plywood at half the size near £8 more expensive LMAO yeah that makes sense. :facepalm:

Veneer on top about £25 for each flavour so between £150 & £300 so too flipping much, so wood work is officially an insane choice of material for me.

So now I know I should just make an all aluminium version :D would be far cheaper & lighter weight too, flipping heck the amount of aluminium I could order for the cost of that basic wood LMAO, it's an absolute no brainer. :D

Bars & sheets of aluminium simply making the aluminium order a little bigger, biggest challenge will be making it not resonate any vibes but yeah it will be a lot cheaper than using sheet wood & veneer & instead of nice looking woods I'll just make it nice some other way, plus making it as a frame & covers it will be very highly moddable in the future, think it might actually be nicer too. :D

So I'll just work the design change to see what material I will need, add them to the order I was going to do for extra materials I need to complete Lean & green, get it ordered with some spare bits to hopefully cover extra bits I do making it up as I go so I won't have any delays running up to the deadline & get extremely busy, gonna need a new screw order too, there will be many used on the pedestal & it has to be as strong or stronger than the one I designed but it will be lighter. :)



Lean & green, main current topic. :D
Worked out a design to make the joining cover nice & sturdy between the 3 pieces, it's a mix of 15mm acrylic & 3mm & 5mm aluminium rods, the curve & bend panel won't be fully fixed on until it's been anodised though because it's fixing on permanently with JB weld but the cover piece will be removable, just the cover will be stuck to the frame support.

Ordered & received 5 shades of silver metallic, black metallic & green metallic, white plastic primer, white primer, 2 cans of clear & worked out the paint job I'll do on the plastic fan blades, the blades on the akasa venom are quite different to the ones pictured in the model & will be a bit of a challenge to do this nicely but very much worth the effort. :D

2 of the shades of silver seem really similar so I'll have to do a faint quick haze of the darker ones for 2 of them so they work as intended together.

I had to do this bit of extra planning ahead to make sure the materials are here & ready for when I get to later stages else I wouldn't have a chance of making the deadline, November is all out gogogogo, fun times, but don't worry about it being rushed & compromised, it won't be, just the volume knob of dedication is going to crank up to maximum, big difference between rushing things & just applying yourself properly. :D

Sorted the design change to support all aluminium instead of wood stacking so now have a lot of hollow space so more difficult to make strong & get nice curves & bends, took me all day yesterday & thought what the heck can I do to make it work & then light bulbs started flickering. :)

Old vs new

Internal support & I might add an extra support near the front, I'll also make a few rod drilling jigs to speed up perfect rod drilling because only the top & bottom ones will be using countersunk screws, the rest will be grub screws.

Couple more shots.

Figured what I need to complete this & bit the bullet ordering the aluminium last night, I'm broke again lol, received the aluminium rods today which I ordered on Monday though so I can complete the HTPC & fans now but because I was at the computer until I passed out last night I need a bit more rest lying down for a few hours to recover. :D

But I'll be constantly pushing forward at it as soon as I recover from the natural hangover. :D

It's hard to believe but I still have some bits to design when I get to further stages of the gaming rig.

"Keep moving forward" - Meet the Robinsons.

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Originally Posted by Fuganater

"Keep moving forward" - Meet the Robinsons.

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:D:up:

This update will seem feeble I know but I've not been slacking, just not been in the workshop much.

Got the extra rods & cut them to size & made a template for placing them correctly in the front corners but with the rods being 3mm & not 2mm I had to change design a touch again else it just wouldn't work so instead of 4 2mm rods I changed it to 2 3mm rods, the rest is the same, think I prefer it with just 2 rods instead anyway.

Now with 2 3mm rods instead of 4 2mm rods.

Thought I'd see how junior hacksaw blades do on the scroll saw because they are a cheap alternative to band saw blades, snipping the ends off with the metal shears which only seem to get used for things like this, the hacksaw blades do the job of cutting 10mm aluminium but they are more prone to snapping if you push them hard unlike the band saw blades, none of those snapped so must be made of a better material or processed better but as long as I stick to the limit before they do snap they will be good, they do a cleaner cut though with being a finer TPI count.

Made a drilling jig for rods using a bit of scrap 10mm plate & bit of a 3mm flat bar, just place the rod to be drilled in the drill vice, plonk this on top, line up & just drill & get perfect results, my favorite DIY tool & it works brilliantly, all these drilling ideas spawned from AngelOD saying how to do nice straight tapping, I just seen more potential from the idea but I probably wouldn't have thought of this without him saying about it, I'll make it compatible for square bars too, will save me heaps of time on precision drilling. :D

Also while doing extra design time I accidentally seen it upside down & I like it, looks so crazy lol. :D

I could make this happen but the fan controller would be upside down & it has digital readings so ugh nah it won't happen now. :D

If it weren't for that though I could, I'd need to add more strength to the gamer rig & a few more supports inside the HTPC because the HTPC will far out weigh the weight of the gaming rig, I feel it's a mistake showing this but it looks more right & I do remember voigts saying to flip the stand upside down in the early stages of this project & heat rising would usually be a problem but everything is covered by a good flow of air.

I'll be sure to post some upside down pictures of the completed rig instead lol. :D

Now I will resume progress & found out I now have until 9th December which makes up for the extra design days I just spent. :)

The front gaming fan mount is 4 5mm sheets stuck together designed to hug the custom fan, it needs some love to stop it from shaking :D also had to make all the fans 1mm deeper, the cover support is 3x 3 layers of 5mm sheets stuck together & 3 3mm rods will keep them aligned together & screwed in place on the flat bar that keeps the stand extra rigid.

Not much to show but I can assure I haven't been slacking 1 bit the past week but I have been mostly sat on my bum lol.

Also the akasa venom fans I was disappointed to find out you can't pop the blades off like you can on the apache fans so that makes painting them a bit trickier but still doable so might just keep the stem that hides the wire instead of all 4 & might even get rid of that 1 just keeping the circular bit. :)

But for now I have many pieces to make & once it's all made I have an epic amount of edge & surface sanding & polishing to do, like the title currently says November is get busy time & I'll kick it off by modding all evening, night & all day tomorrow & update in the evening. :D

Instead of sleeping last night I did this. :D

Figured out a nice solution to the blade heating up & melting the acrylic when cutting thicker stuff, good old copper flat bar with a tiny slit in the bar, enough to touch both sides & the back of the blade, works brilliant but they can overheat still so I made an extra & found that wasn't enough so made 3 in total so I could cut none stop, awesome. :D

This is part of the gaming rig front fan mount & is 20mm thick without 8mm round bar.

With 8mm round bar.

The support pieces for the cover join piece.

Loose fit.

Back to the fan mount & got that mill bit out again to mill the slot for the 10mm square bar it mounts to & it went pretty damn nicely, seems to handle acrylic a lot better. :)

This fan mount piece is complete but I think I went a bit overkill by using 3 brass inserts. :D

Now I had to mark & file down 3 15mm sections for the support piece in the stands front flat bar, then drill & countersink mount holes & because the right side of the flat bar dips down an extra 1mm I had to file that side down to make it work right.

Turned out perfect, I added brass thread inserts into the acrylic pieces & these are now solid with a nice 1mm space all along where I need it to stick the bent & curved panel there.

I took a break at this point. :)

So impressive. Every single update no matter how small still wows.

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Originally Posted by Stonerboy779

So impressive. Every single update no matter how small still wows.

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Thanks Stonerboy779, :):up: this will test that comment. :D

Joining cover piece.

Bends are the right angles but they aren't sharp enough for how I want them & I think it may have been impossible to do the curves so I'm going to use the bend & curve lines from the design & use a hack saw blade & sharp thin file to thin out the bend & curve points to make it more doable.

4 hours doing this but figured what I need to do to get it right so not a complete waste, reason it took so long is the opposing bends & me needing to figure out an alternative way to do the 2nd bend. :)

This was a fail update lol. :D

Getting sharp bends without a mechanical bender is tough.

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Originally Posted by Fuganater

Getting sharp bends without a mechanical bender is tough.

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It sure can be, the brake folder I bought was worth every penny and I could not have done without it on my present build, it saves so much time and instead of shelving ideas because they are going to be too much hassle I now enjoy doing it.

I bought this folder on ebay UK built by an engineering company it's heavy duty compared to most of the other cheap folders you see on ebay and I've easily folded ali up to 3mm thick with it, they have them for sale on ebay now.

If you don't want to spend that much on a folder these vice jaw benders (ebay) work well and are good for folds up to six inches wide.

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Originally Posted by Fuganater

Getting sharp bends without a mechanical bender is tough.

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It is but the thinning down bend lines worked perfect. :):up:

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Originally Posted by Beta-brain

It sure can be, the brake folder I bought was worth every penny and I could not have done without it on my present build, it saves so much time and instead of shelving ideas because they are going to be too much hassle I now enjoy doing it.

I bought this folder on ebay UK built by an engineering company it's heavy duty compared to most of the other cheap folders you see on ebay and I've easily folded ali up to 3mm thick with it, they have them for sale on ebay now.

If you don't want to spend that much on a folder these vice jaw benders (ebay) work well and are good for folds up to six inches wide.

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Got a table top bender but a budget one by Sealey not bad for 750mm wide by 1mm thick at full load but would be better off with one like yours :D & bought 1 of those small vice benders when I started modding but they are very hard to use accurately, when tightening it the sheet can slip out of place making for bends where you don't want them, :facepalm: I'm sure they are accurate once you know exactly how to use them though. :D
Thanks Beta-brain. :)

PITA piece take 2. :D
Freshly cut & flattened external edges, scored the lines with scalpel.

Snipped a piece of hack saw blade off, clamped a steel ruler along all the lines & shuffled until they were decently thinned, I went deeper for the actual bends.

Took a 30 min break from the tedious session hehe. :)

Time to bend & yes indeedy the workshop is a heck of a mess & no, DOF couldn’t do anything about this shot unfortunately, lets focus on hitting that deadline instead lol. :D

2nd bend & with it being so close to the other one & it being an opposing bend I had to use the bender unconventionally, clamping the piece on the wrong side & then flipping it upside down on the floor & carefully pressing something flat against it.

Main 2 bends done & this is the result I was after, sharp defined bends. :)

Now the fun part, faint curves, tried many silly ways at first but realised I just couldn't do it in a good way due to the bends, here is 1 of the silly ways I tried. :D

So I straightened out 1 of the bends & did faint bends on the lines & then re bent the last bend point & the faint bends made too much of a curve so had to tweak them as good as I could, this took far longer than I anticipated but knew it wouldn’t be an easy part. :D

I'll use button head screws so I can be sure of it fitting how I want it to, I'll just paint the screw heads to match the anodise colour, need more brass inserts though, only got 1 left so I'll leave doing updates until I have something good to show which I hope will be tomorrow & every day after leading up to the 9th of December. :)

Dude, when I look at your work on a timeline, I'm taken aback at how quickly you have progressed from a "dabbler" to a skilled craftsman/artist. For those of you who may have not seen Waynio's prior projects you should take a stroll through his old worklogs. It is proof positive looking at "Frankencase" (below) built in just 2008 that with hard work and attention to detail can develop awesome talent. And from that simple case fab to this...it's humbling. Great work my friend, you are teaching all of us alot!

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Originally Posted by jdbnsn

Dude, when I look at your work on a timeline, I'm taken aback at how quickly you have progressed from a "dabbler" to a skilled craftsman/artist. For those of you who may have not seen Waynio's prior projects you should take a stroll through his old worklogs. It is proof positive looking at "Frankencase" (below) built in just 2008 that with hard work and attention to detail can develop awesome talent. And from that simple case fab to this...it's humbling. Great work my friend, you are teaching all of us alot!

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:D Thanks jd :up: first ones were barely worklogs though really, they were projects but I didn't keep a proper log of them like I do now, the frame work on Frankencase looked like swiss cheese from miss drilling & tapping, was an important one to make though, got to take that first step & the rougher it is the more you will want to do another to get better, I got obsessed with getting better. :D:up:

Mid session update since I got interrupted, this must be why I prefer modding through the night, can just go at it none stop. :D

The HDD level covers before bending.

Using that awesome rod centre drilling tool & oh yes it's awesome :D makes very quick work of precision rod drilling & with using a drill press it should last a long time.

Tapping takes as long as it always has though lol.

Threw some parts together for the fan but still have 2 1mm pieces & the hoop to make & to file some edge off all 4 rod pieces but I got to say it feels nice & solid like this & it slots on the perch perfectly, very happy with it. :)

HDD cover loose fit but I didn't like how the bending went for the mounting tabs so I'll remake them without the tabs & just make them a perfect height so they hold in on their own when tightening the screws for the level above.

29 Days left arrrrrrrgh lol. :D

Having fun though now I'm really seeing it coming together more & I have 2 brass inserts which is enough to fix 1 side of the stand cover in place, that's a sweet fit too, loving how this is going & should have another update later on, going to fix the front corner rods in place & remake the HDD cover, that will probably take a fair bunch of hours so I don't know if I'll get to complete the fan today but the HTPC & stand is sooooo close to complete on the initial fabrication side. :D

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Originally Posted by jdbnsn

Dude, when I look at your work on a timeline, I'm taken aback at how quickly you have progressed from a "dabbler" to a skilled craftsman/artist. For those of you who may have not seen Waynio's prior projects you should take a stroll through his old worklogs. It is proof positive looking at "Frankencase" (below) built in just 2008 that with hard work and attention to detail can develop awesome talent. And from that simple case fab to this...it's humbling. Great work my friend, you are teaching all of us alot!

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I remember that build, I think I said that "It reminds me of a machine from some mad professors laboratory" Considering what Waynio is building now I'm sure that was quite an accurate description :D

Seriously though as Lean and Green comes together and things fall into place it really is looking quite stunning, although I do worry that Waynio may suffer serious scroll saw withdrawal symptoms when he's finished ;)

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Originally Posted by Beta-brain

I remember that build, I think I said that "It reminds me of a machine from some mad professors laboratory" Considering what Waynio is building now I'm sure that was quite an accurate description :D

Seriously though as Lean and Green comes together and things fall into place it really is looking quite stunning, although I do worry that Waynio may suffer serious scroll saw withdrawal symptoms when he's finished ;)

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:D Remember the comment lol was it here or at OCUK?.
Withdrawals, lol I'll have plenty of spare or scrap material to make other things after this, also got a corsair r400 case from a magazine article for stealthlow, might make it my first case mod, cheers mate. :D:up:

1mm Aluminium for the last 2 fan pieces & the new HDD cover, old one wasn't too great with the tabs not working out well.

All panels made for the HTPC 140mm fan, cut the new HDD covers & put them aside for when I do the front corner rods & also cut the 5 140mm & 2 120mm fan ring pieces, to shape them perfect I'll look for a hard round object about 20mm smaller diameter of the needed ring to get that bit of needed over curve, a bit of spring back will be good for it.

Still need to file the inside edges of the rods so they are level to the 2mm panels before I can add the fan motor with blades, I'll just do a loose fit for seeing how the fan looks with the motor & blades in because the fan is going to be JB welded to the anodised piece.

How it currently looks, not bad progress & keep in mind all the scruffiness on edges & surfaces will be cleaned up but later in the project. :)

I'll have to take apart stealthlow real soon & install the noctua cooler to get hardware measurements so I can design the triple fan mount in case I need to make the fans with extra mount points & possibly design a shroud for the motherboard & maybe the GPU & sound card too, we'll see but I will sure be cutting it fine for completing in time, feels a bit like a mission impossible but I'm giving it a good go. :D

Truly looks beautiful 8)

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Remember the comment lol was it here or at OCUK?

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It would have been here I've not posted on OCUK, incidentally, I want to get a scroll saw and obviously yours must be a good one to endure the workout you have given it, what size is your saw I've been checking Excalibur scroll saws the cheapest is the 16" EX-16 which about £490 which is a bit more than I thought but I know you get what you pay for especially with tools.

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Originally Posted by Beta-brain

Truly looks beautiful 8)



It would have been here I've not posted on OCUK, incidentally, I want to get a scroll saw and obviously yours must be a good one to endure the workout you have given it, what size is your saw I've been checking Excalibur scroll saws the cheapest is the 16" EX-16 which about £490 which is a bit more than I thought but I know you get what you pay for especially with tools.

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Thanks mate :) yeah these saws are expensive, I went for the 30" model, they are trade rated so good for long sessions like I've been putting it through, I usually cheap out on tools :D but I believe the saw is worth every penny if you intend to use one a lot, I did buy a cheap one not sure if I'd like it & loved what I could do with it so when I had a grand from a wind fall I got the saw & a DSLR camera & nice lens with change left over. :)

Another tool I use a lot is the disc sander, that is an essential for me now, lets me do rough quick cuts of the exterior of pieces & then just grind it down to the perfect point making it nicely flat, great for bevels too, a belt sander would be better but the disc one is easier maintenance & more compact. :D

Wow, that's the 30" model that's a serious piece of kit, I'm not that envious :whistler:

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Originally Posted by Beta-brain

Wow, that's the 30" model that's a serious piece of kit, I'm not that envious :whistler:

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:D It's so nice & another way of looking at the price of it is it's not much more expensive than a high end single GPU but the saw will last a lot longer than a GPU. :):up:

Went to do a session but figured I should design the spindicator electronics case, it's not quite a simple box but it will help to clean up the mass of wires to do with it & will prevent it from having an accidental short & it only just fits into the space by the PSU. :)

I'll make a start on it along with getting the rods installed, 10mm plates rounded, HDD covers installed, fan completed & get the stand cover installed so I'll be modding all night with an update or 2 tomorrow some time. :D

OK I was a little bit too ambitious about what I said I'll do on my previous update but I made some progress. :D

Got a start on the spindicator electronics casing 3 5mm acrylic sheets.

Stuck together.

Both aluminium covers.

Then made a start on the fan by filing the rods.

1 of them went nicely because I took care doing it, the others I got careless, they work nicely but don't cling to the hoop because of taking too much off so with this one being on full show I'll likely make new ones & use these ones for fans that aren't on full show.

Making the hoop, used whatever I could to get a basic hoop, the strip was too long so had to grind ?mm off bit by bit until...

It finally clicked in place. :D

Then you align the 2mm panel & work the hoop into it until it sits flush.

Then you put your fan in there or as I done mount the front 1mm panel.

I bent the 2nd set of HDD covers, they are good but making them join to the rod & look good how I designed it is really difficult to do, I tried using the mill bit to flatten a length of the bar so the cover would sit flush but I screwed up, I'll work out a way, an idea has already formed while writing this out & it's a good one but does require a 3rd fabrication of the covers. :)

But yeah, I couldn't resist chopping up 1 of the aluminium fans to put it in there lol, snipped all the LEDs off it & cut the outer frame off & the fan & 4 plastic legs slid in perfectly. :D

So I got 1 bit done & 2 other bits semi done, really can't wait to complete the HTPC so I can move over to the gaming rig.

Loving the custom fans, you have to wrestle the hoops into place but when they click in it's just an awesome satisfying moment. :D

Dat fan grill...

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Loving the custom fans, you have to wrestle the hoops into place but when they click in it's just an awesome satisfying moment.

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I live for those moments when all the parts you've made come together and fit as well or even better than you hoped, you forget about all the grief that it took to get there and it seems worth it and gives you the encouragement to carry on and finish the project.

I've had a few good days on my build recently and that's already got me thinking about my next build, it's an addiction, but as you have said about your previous builds you learn from them and see how you could have done something better or made it easier and that only comes with time, effort and spending silly amounts of money on projects, I'm a mechanic by trade so I know how machines work but building them from scratch, that's something else altogether, but that's how you get the experience 8)

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Originally Posted by Fuganater

Dat fan grill...

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:D Thanks Fuga & congrats for MOTM BTW. :banana:

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Originally Posted by Beta-brain

I live for those moments when all the parts you've made come together and fit as well or even better than you hoped, you forget about all the grief that it took to get there and it seems worth it and gives you the encouragement to carry on and finish the project.

I've had a few good days on my build recently and that's already got me thinking about my next build, it's an addiction, but as you have said about your previous builds you learn from them and see how you could have done something better or made it easier and that only comes with time, effort and spending silly amounts of money on projects, I'm a mechanic by trade so I know how machines work but building them from scratch, that's something else altogether, but that's how you get the experience 8)

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Think that's a part of what makes us mod on :D kinda like gaming on a hard game & overcoming the challenge but modding is better than that. 8)

I made today an easier day because I was starting to get worn out lol.

Resumed the spindicator electronics casing by first flattening the edges of the acrylic stack & then some drill milling but I took my time doing it to not strain the press. :)

After that I countersunk all the mounting holes & then plugged brass inserts with the soldering iron into the middle of the 15mm stack so it could be shared by 2 8mm countersunk screws on both sides.

Then cut the internal piece out. using the copper cooling trick on the blade.

Acrylic piece done.

Then had to countersink a tiny bit more to make them nicely flush fitting screws on the 1mm outer panels, turned out nice. :)

The electronics this case is for.

I used vinyl on the underside for the electronics in the hope that will be good enough to prevent short circuit, if it isn't though I can paint the solder points with liquid electrical tape or put a layer of electrical tape down.

The Molex plug slots in place really nice, I intentionally left some space around the PCB.

Top cover on & this little case is done.

For the rest of the wires going from this to the spindicator I will make a quick channel case from acrylic & aluminium scraps that keeps all the wires safe from snags & cleans the looks up even though it will only ever be seen during building up but will be nice to know there isn't chance of wire snags.

I might get this HTPC completed some time lol. :D

Had a huge session starting yesterday & finished up at noon today, was well in the mod zone to go on all day but had to go supermarket, it broke my flow, came back ate some food, was just about to get stuck back into this but after setting things up to continue my senses must have dulled rapidly, yawning my head off with sloppy hand eye coordination, made a coffee & a tea for my dad I knocked the full fresh hot cup of tea on my crotch lol, I took it as a clear sign to not continue modding today or I would screw something up badly, luckily I was wearing thick jeans & it stopped me from getting burnt but it looked like I peed myself, oh well. :D


Getting the rods to exact tight fit, took a while. :D

Then started taking it all apart to add the mounting holes for the rods & to take some material out so the revised HDD cage covers look better by not showing the ends of the bent covers.

Then a hefty load of drilling & tapping, showing the 5mm rod I drilled & tapped for m3 screws here, this shows how awesome that rod drill helper is being able to do this, pretty amazing DIY tool I think but drilling the longer rods was more difficult, had to use my square to make sure I was drilling square. :D

Other bits I did but didn't take pictures along the way, was focusing on progressing more.

Rounded the edges of all the 10mm plates, removed the teeth marks on the power switch piece using the new detail sander, took apart the power switch piece a few times to shorten the width so it would fit in with the rods.

The 3mm rods I couldn't do where I did the mounting holes so I'll have to carefully move the 3mm holes forward a touch or buy 2mm rod but it comes on coils so would have to make it perfectly straight so I'm going to try moving the holes forward 0.5mm, as long as I do it with extreme care it should work nicely still.

The rounded edges, 5mm & 10mm rods installed using countersunk screws & grub screws for the level change, good & solid.

I am aiming to get the HTPC done this weekend though & when I say done I mean the main structure completed, not the finishing touches like cable management holes, edge & surface finishing, I'll likely wake up during the night & get back onto it & try to have it done by the end of Sunday so I can start on the gaming rig on Monday. :)

man those rods look great! I'm excited to see this first case done.

That spindicator electronics casing is a very neat job 8)
I tried drill milling ali in my cheap old drill press, results were inconsistent :rolleyes:

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Fuganater

man those rods look great! I'm excited to see this first case done.

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Thanks mate, appreciated. :):up:

Quote:

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Originally Posted by Beta-brain

That spindicator electronics casing is a very neat job 8)
I tried drill milling ali in my cheap old drill press, results were inconsistent :rolleyes:

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Turned out nice :D seem to be able to drill mill acrylic quite nice with the new press, did the same on my last project & on copper, wow not a good result but also didn't have a cross vice then, they make a nice difference. :D
Thanks Beta-brain. :):up:

Would have continued pressing on at superman levels but I got demoted on bit-tech, the place I was making the extra effort for so thought screw it, back to a normal human pace now. :):up:

Wow it looks like I've been away too long. I had to catch up. Looks awesome. You are one of the modders I always try to follow in my very busy schedule. I wish I had more time to look at every build but I would never get anything done!

Keep up the good work.

You do an awe-inspiring job, sir. Keep it up!

Quote:

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Originally Posted by BS Mods

Wow it looks like I've been away too long. I had to catch up. Looks awesome. You are one of the modders I always try to follow in my very busy schedule. I wish I had more time to look at every build but I would never get anything done!

Keep up the good work.

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Thanks mate I'm honored. :)
I pulled a bit of a hand brake needing a little time out, was going at it every day aiming for a deadline but something distracted me, was a simple thing but it broke my focus. :facepalm:

Quote:

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Originally Posted by billygoat333

You do an awe-inspiring job, sir. Keep it up!

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Thanks billygoat333 :)

Where it was since last session but now with the 3rd revision of the HDD covers & they fit in there nicely, I also had to drill the 3mm holes a bit closer to the edge so the rods could fit in.

The 5mm & 10mm rods with grub screws in for the tapped rods above.

View from underneath where they are countersunk screwed in & the 3mm holes I drilled straight through & extended them more outwards so they'll fit in.

How it is now with all the rods in place, this all needs a heck of a cleaning up by light filing & sanding to make it look a lot nicer, it'll get there.

Right here I noticed how the light caught the dual layer side panels creating a sweet contrast so thought I'd take a shot, bit like a preview of the intended look of what the contrasts will look like when everything gets anodised but not this colour. :)

I'm still wishing I put all the mounting points in on the design phase before I got on with making this but once I'm past this HTPC & stand everything else should be far more straight forward.

Some more shots.

Other news.
Been wanting to make my dad a nice xbmc for quite a while & was browsing around fleabay for a cheap mini-ITX mobo & seen an Asus E35M1-I Deluxe same as the one I'm using on mine but 2nd hand for £68, owner had it since August, took the memory out of my current rig & put it in, tested & it's all good, then I finally installed the Samsung memory I bought a bit ago into my current rig, it's 10mm lower than normal low profile memory, low voltage & highly overclockable, no heat sink & a black PCB, got it running at 2133mhz 10,10,10,28 @1.45v, really nice memory & will be nicer still when I take the stickers off. :)

More soon. :)