Project - Air Cube v2

Hi all, time for my imaginatively titled Air Cube v2 to get done :D sorry could not think of a good title so it is a spare of the moment title.

I got the flat bars and angle bars today of the aluminium, and I should have the sheets tomorrow. at last woohoo :D lol i'm a tad excited for my next modding fix.:banana:
The flat bars are 20mm wide by 3mm thick / angle bars are 12.7mm x 12.7mm x 1.58mm
the sheets are 1mm thick for components like any add on parts and cages and 1.5mm thick for top, mid, bottom, front, sides and back panels.

insert completed project pic here ;)

Here is the new small 2-5mm hss countersink bit I just bought and these are the little m3 countersunk allen head bolts and half nuts, I'm hoping I will not need rivets at all for this so it can all be dismantled easily for painting and further mods.

Here is the main structure I will be making 1st of all which I hope will be strong, probably got over 30 120mm fans in bags lol, so 3 for the front instead of the 200mm fan this time so it will need to be about 30mm wider than planned but that can be a good thing for hdd wire space, 2 for the true, 1 at back and 1 in front of the hdd's.
I'll be swapping all the fans when I can afford to with the akasa apache 120mm fans as they are 57cfm at only 16db and are rated to last 50,000 hours so should make for a nice very quiet well air cooled case.

I'm going to have my 1st go on a drill press with this project and plan to use it quite a bit, hope it is as good as I imagine it would be, I'll be sure to very carefully do the measuring and marking and it should be fine I hope :D, lucky my dad is into motorbikes and has done a bit of restoration work on them so he has a few very useful tools to compliment the ones I have bought. He has a powerful air compressor that is outstanding for making a dust clogged pc look like brand new :), still yet to get into using quality paint with a paint gun and air brush, annodising seems quite hazardous unless you really know what you are doing but I think it would be my prefered choice or I could just pollish it to a mirror finnish.

I'm very tired from over exercising every day for the past month I'm shattered lol so will start on the project in a couple of days when i'm a bit more sparky :D as long as the aluminium sheets come tomorrow.

So hopefully I will not bore you all any further and just post pics with as short as possible descriptions whenever I progress a bit further :D.

Compliments & pointers are very welcome ;) if you think I'm doing a good job once I have some actual work in progress shots.

lucky. I wish I had some of those tools

Drill presses are awesome. I had no idea how much I needed one until I got one. Wow. Best suggestion for those is a fence. You don't have to build a table or anything, you can clamp a board to the factory table. Even a fence like that will make the tool twice as useful.

Good luck on the project, will be looking for updates.

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Best suggestion for those is a fence

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:? How do you mean a fence :? I'm baffled lol :D

Or is that what you meant

Quote:

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you can clamp a board to the factory table

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Something like this:

http://www.harborfreight.com/cpi/cta...emnumber=96395

Obviously by just clamping a board to the table you just get the vertical part of the setup above, but it's perfect for drilling multiple holes exactly the same distance from an edge, for example.

Ahh :facepalm: I see how that would make it even better for what I want to do, thanks for the suggestion:up:.

Did not get the aluminium sheets the next day and I'm expecting them today, it is now 2 weeks ago today when I made my aluminium order, they said the sheets got damaged in transit but still, 2 weeks, wish I paid a little extra for next day delivery :neutral: I'll know for my next order :).

WooHooo Got the rest of the aluminium today and its all in perfect condition :D

Not quite prepared to start on it yet, but by friday I will.

Thursday evening
Made a start & I measured & marked the 2m bars ready for cutting.

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Friday mid day
Only got all the bars cut to size with a hacksaw with 1 slightly wrong, good thing I bought a little extra for if I mess up made another 1 and here is how it will be going together.

Was really getting stuck into it but was getting aggravated quite easily so I called it a day as I figured I'd end up making a pile of mistakes with not being nice and calm :).

Received 1 akasa apache fan in the post, tried it out & it is nice and quiet with very good air flow for an almost silent fan so I'll be ordering another 6 close to the case being complete, then I'll have to do something about my enermax galaxy to use a quieter fan setup.

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Saturday morning
Very late start at 15:00 lazy day :)
overlapped the bottom angle bar pieces and marked the bits that needed to be removed so the angles slot together for a flush connection, hacksaw and file used.
Here is one of the angle ends which I cut and filed.

here is the lowest base loosely fitted together

here is the 1.5mm thick sheet snugly fit inside the frame with little angle bars which will support the corner angle bars, I'm happy with how its going so far but kind of dreading the drilling I'll be doing tomorrow lol, as you can see I'm going to have to get through 3 layers precisely or it will mess up, but I'm hoping to at least get this bottom base complete and bolted together tomorrow.

1 more thing, the camera I'm using olympus fe-170 6mp, I have noticed it is giving a fish bowl look about it as some parts look slightly curved, but the actual bars are definately straight, pretty strange :think:.

Did not wake up til 15:00 because of watching ufc 100 in the early hours :).

Did want to start early today so Made no progress on the case, but made a fence from a shelf that my dad had lying around and now I can see how useful it will be, the drilling will be 100% more easier now, thank you blue for recomending a fence :).

This is the progress made today.
The bottom panel was easy to drill with the fence I made, it was the little corner bits that was hard to pull off while keeping it all square but got there in the end phew :), I am considering countersunk rivets instead of the little nuts & bolts in some areas like the corners for extra sturdyness :), but they will do for now as I can dismantle and rebuild whenever needed, but I'm definatley using the nuts & bolts for the front & top panel.
The countersink bit was well worth getting for the nice flush fittings, I'll probably turn all the bolts the other way round on the bottom panel so its all flush inside and add some nice big custom case feet underneath.

Building from the ground up so could be made shorter when I get to that point.

The corner bits were tricky to pull off, they would be better riveted for extra strength.

Underneath, the base is really sturdy :).

Bummer :mad:, got to put it on hold for at least a week until I can buy an extra square and some clamps, I was attaching the mid panel angle bar but needed a 3rd square and clamps to hold it all in place while I mark it up for drilling, could have carried on but it may have turned out a little wonky, so I'll just put it aside for a week, oh well :neutral:.

Let me know how you all think it is coming along for the time being:).

Ahh was able to make an order yesterday for some clamps, squares and a couple of smaller steel rulers, I only had a 1 metre ruler and was arkward to use in some areas so should hopefully be able to carry on with it today once I receive them :).

Nice, got the bits I needed to make it good form, yay :).

Didn't get much time on it today but it progressed a little.
Took all the corner bars off and layed them flat so I could make the mid angle bar spot on with 4 squares and a flat piece to line it up on so I could mark them accurately.
Got both front and back mid angle bars done and 1 flat bar half done, the reason for the 20mm gap is for if I choose to put in a window it will have no obstruction and should come in useful for hiding wires also, the front and rear angle bars have 2mm gaps either side to hold the slide panel in place nice and firm, it is also still very light but I'm only half way through making the frame.

I'm hoping to have the frame finished tomorrow.

Looking good, the frame should be rock solid when it's done, and give you plenty of room to work. +rep

Thanks blue it will be very solid when I replace the bolts with rivets, it is already but rivets are easier to remove than a socketless screw.

Frame done and is nice and square, just needs cleaning up and replace all the screws & nuts with countersunk rivets which I do not have yet, the screws I used 3 of them lost the socket and went round, was a nightmare getting them out, this is why I am going to use rivets for the entire frame would be easier drilling rivets out than the struggle I had getting the srews out, anyway now I can work on the panels I'm going to take my time for a good design still not designed the shell, definately happy with the frame thou.

On with the pics

Made a little more progress today
Got the side panels to fit so they can slide to the bottom they just need to be cut to size at the top and bent over.

Cut a sheet for the motherboard tray and aligned an old motherboard tray over it, aligned it how I wanted it and taped it together and pressed my perm marker through the holes and pci slits and it was ready for drilling, tapping and cutting.

From the front

A bit closer front shot

From the back

Closer back shot

Sliding slot for side panels

Done the mounting holes and started on the pci slits

Almost done, just needs filing and tapping.

Needs filing with precision files

Slight error in design to form, I made the little corner angle pieces smaller in my sketchup and left the angle pieces same dimensions as the main corner bars so the little bars stick out a bit, so I cut the bottom corners out of the panels, this shot is in close up and does not look bad unless you get very close to it.

I just got the idea whilst writing this to file the little angle pieces to be flush with the main angle pieces, But would have to order 2 new sheets of aluminium to fix this, Doh!, so I will have to put up with this for now and may as well do a no thrills design for it and when I get the 2 pieces and have filed down the angle pieces, then do a nice design on it.

What would you guys do, would you settle for this result or would you get 2 more sheets?

very very cool :P i like it

:D TY DonT-FeaR

Tried using my cheap tapping kit, there was no size right for the standoffs, then tried drilling a hole slightly smaller than the standoffs and put the standoff in driver and let it make the thread, it worked for some and did not work for most others, then tried a bolt that had similar thread same problem, then tried some rivet nuts, the rivet nuts would have been ok but the thread did not start soon enough for the short thread on the standoffs so was in a pickle for a while until my dad mentioned about some square nuts he had, they worked a treat :banana:.

WooHoo :) got them to mount with some square nuts on the other side.

Also got the front and back panels cut and filed to size and put a guide for where I can drill holes for mounting

Your workmanship continues to impress. :) As for what would I do on the other problem, it would depend. If I had the time and money I would order the extra sheets now, if not I would just be sure to keep in mind that I would be correcting it later and plan (and build) accordingly.

If you mentioned it earlier in the thread I missed it, so forgive me, but where did you get the motherboard tray?

haha sweet :P

:) thanks for comments

I've got the time, just not really the spare money, if I could just go to the stockist in person I would happily get 2 fresh sheets as it would only be £16 the £10 postage is good when ordering a lot, but just 2 sheets, I over ordered with the bars just wish I did with the sheets:facepalm:, but this is my v2 and want it to look good and be my final cube case before doing something different so I think yes I will order them tomorrow, at least the sheets that will be coming out of this project will come in handy for other something else some time, its always good to have some scrap.

The tray I used for aligning the holes was from a cheap atx case, the back expansion I/O piece is from the last case I bought, a Lian-Li PC-A70A, I mounted an old motherboard on the tray I made last night and the standoffs I bought off ebay are taller than regular ones so the back panel is too low and does not line up correctly so I need to order some normal standoffs.

Wow and duh I just got an idea, the side panels have not been cut down to size yet so I can just cut the bottom bit down, again blue you stirred a good idea for me by making me think about it TY :D.

This update is tiny but took a fair bit of effort to get right so here goes.

Luckily I had not cut the top ends of the side panels to size, so I went and took all the little angle bars off and filed them down so I could re do the side panels, I messed up twice so could only afford to make 1 more mistake, it took me hours to get it right because on my last chance I filed a little then fit the panel on over and over a whole load of times before it was just perfect, I'm just glad I progressed a tiny bit today so it was not a waste of time and effort :).

Had 3 chances to get it right from here and was getting worried I'd have to order more alu by my last chance.

This is how it looks from the inside.

External, Just perfect imo.

nicely done

Got my new vandel switches blue ring and blue dot, ordered proper motherboard standoffs & screws, ordered countersunk rivets, ordered the other 6 akasa apaches, only other thing I will need to order is paint but I have some deciding to do and cutting on the panels before I get there, had a good day modding today :).

Rather than take the frame apart over and over I built up a platform from a crate, a load of beer, some planks of wood and a chopping board lol so I could use the drill press directly on the case, it worked flawless, saved a lot of messing about :D.

With side panels

Top shot with all panels on, still yet to make the top panel :D

Shot from front :D

looks good mate.. keep it going!

Thanks will do :).

Today I found out the hard way that my sheet metal folder can not bend 1.5mm sheet aluminium precisely, it bended on one end better than the other, I stupidly took it for granted that it would be fine.

So it kind of messes up the plan for the side panels also, I do have 4 x 750mm x 500mm x 1mm sheet aluminium and a couple of metres of angle bar and a couple of metres of flat bar.

So I cut the bent part off and filed it flat and will have to be screwed into the top of the frame or slotted on.

Or

I could make what I had planned (angle flap on each side and side panels with an angle to hold down the top) but with 1mm thick sheet as I know I can bend 1mm no problem.
The side panels I have an idea to attach an angle bar to the top and file it down so it has something to grip to pull the panels off and still keep the slight gap covered, thats for tomorrow.

The motherboard tray has turned out ok with the normal sized standoffs.

More tomorrow hopefully.

Very nice. I like the countersunk bolts.

Thanks Will.

I went to do some on the case and only got the inside angle bars drilled for going up against the side panels to hold them in place well at the bottom, but was feeling a bit tired to drill the case & mount them inside the case as it all needs stripping down to the bottom panel so I'm having the day off and possibly tomorrow from the project, only got 3 to 4 hours sleep last night because of having to be up early for deliveries, got all the fans now and the ocz freeze thermal paste.
Still waiting for the countersunk rivets and some nutserts for the top panel, will hopefully have them by tomorrow.
I'm thinking of getting some nice draw handles and cutting them down a little to place near the bottom of the side panels so they can be pulled into place easier, that is only if I have any trouble getting them to slot in thou.

:D Couple more steps forward today and the countersunk rivets arrived, saving doing the rivets for the final build after it has been painted, I have everything now except the paint so no more waiting for deliveries yay :).

Got the bottom angle bars installed for holding the side panels up against the frame.

Took all the mid panel bars off and filed them down a little because some of them were a smidge over the edge but took a little too much off but they work the same as before.

Marked and drilled the motherboard back piece mounting holes, and cut with the dremel and filed the hole for the back piece and attached the tray.

Thats all for today, more tomorrow :).

Looks cool man. Gotta love a total scratch build. :up:

Thanks Mark :)

I thought about making my own mesh now I'm using a drill press, this is a rough example on some scrap I did with a few different size drill bits, if I do try this I will mark the piece for a good guide and can get pretty close to where the pci slots are.

This is how close I can get to the pci slot area.

I had to come up with an idea for using the reinforced cutting discs as the hole was too big for my mandrel so the discs were cutting ok but shortly after went flying off, here is my beta :).

The dremel fix works great and was able to do the whole psu hole and there is still plenty left on the cutting disc :), only bad thing about the dremel in the summer is it heats up fast, when I did my last case in winter it could go all day and not get a bit warm, so I will have to come up with something to cool it down faster.

My dad said he wanted to use the garage so I packed and cleaned up for the day, so More tomorrow.

:D Well my dad did not use the garage so I thought why not get back at it :):banana:.

Here is roughly how the psu is going to be mounted.

Well I went for it with trying my own mesh lol, the drill press was getting hot so had to have regular breaks from it so I would not damage it, these pics are spread out over quite a few hours, I used a 6.5mm dewalt drill bit, I think it turned out pretty good :).

1st marked the hole which the drill press could reach to and then made marks every 6mm down and across.

On with the drilling :).

I'll replace the final pic with a better one tomorrow when I have good day light, was getting dark when I finnished.

like your improvised "mesh" :P good work. looks very clean! :) +rep

I agree, the mesh is very well done, looks very even. :)

mesh is gunna look wicked once you take the lines off..

Thanks for the feedback m8s :) it was a gamble doing the mesh I know, but I have to say it looks damn good, so relieved :).

Tried using a hole saw I bought a while ago, I was had as it is for wood not metal, price for a good near 120mm metal cutting hole saw is close to £30 I paid £10 so my fault really.

So had to go back to my dremel for doing the fan hole, got about a 3rd of the way round and it was too hot to hold, so thought ok I will make a cooler for it right away with a couple of noisy high cfm fans and a bit of scrap aluminium, it works very nice :D, it takes a minute or less to get it nice and cool again, where if I just let it cool off by itself it takes up to an hour.

And here are a couple of shots with the plastic pulled back a bit :).

Only the edges need sanding so it is nice and smooth then the back panel is done and ready for painting or pollishing, Woohoo :).

looks great man! good work

That looks like a real big case, what's the final measurement? (Sorry but in a hurry since its near end of office hour :D )

Hech yeah that "mesh" came out great. I tried that once and failed miserably. +rep fo sho

Thanks for comments everyone :).
On the google sketchup the frame alone was 360mm wide, 360mm deep, 423mm high but I decided I will be mounting 3 120mm fans on the front so had to make a simple change of width to 390mm which will give better space for hdd's also.
I just measured the form of it now and it is 387mm wide, 365mm deep, 442mm high. That is with panels on.
But I will be putting an extension on the front also like my last case only better I hope :).
After I made the frame, it is mostly all freestyle pretty much althou I am also thinking what will be best before I actually go for it.


Here is my method for marking a mountable piece, I used this method for the front of my last case. Mark around the piece and cut Cotton buds to size and push them into the holes on the piece I want to mount and put a blob of paint on the ends, then carefully press it against the panel and we should have perfect marks for working on :).

Here is my psu stand wip, since this pic I have siliconed the bars together and I'm leaving them clamped until tomorrow and then sand them down and mount.

And here is a few shots of the 3 fans mounted (not these fans, akasa apache's are going in the final build), I'm yet to cut the holes for the fans, I found out about the Dremel 545 Diamond Wheel and is supposed to be awesome, long lasting and is nice and thin for detailed work so have ordered 1 and just after I ordered it I seen 1 on ebay for £6 so ordered that too :).

Just about perfect fit for 3 120mm fans, ultra close.

And finally I have decided not to paint it and try to polish the whole case to a mirror finnish, should be quite a mission :).