Original Playstation (PSX) Shell Reproduction

Hello :)

Okay, I am sure we are all rather familiar with the original Sony Playstation ("PSX") as it is one of the most notable consoles of the fifth generation.

Back in the heyday of the console, a reasonably large modding community was created. Who looked to modify nearly every aspect of the console. Popular modifications included rewiring the chip to play region locked games or "backups". Another popular modification was to the looks of the console - one being changing the console shell (or casing) from the rather drab grey to something more interesting.

Shuttle forward to 2013 (now) and the PSX is starting to gain traction in being a "retro console". I bought a PSX a few years back to re-live my childhood and the experience of my first own video-game console. Since then I've aquired 3 PSX's of different models. One of which is a SCPH-5502 variant with a mod-chip pre-installed.

Out of the three, I would really like to do something with this console - make it unique. I would like to change the colour of the console quite a bit. And after seeing pictures of people who have replacement shells for their PSX'es I think that would be a viable option for myself.

Now its been a good 10 years at least since these shells have been widely manufactured, and after some searching I have only found one site in the US who has a few translucent blue replacement shells for about $40. But I don't really want an electric blue PSX, instead I want either:
- Smoke grey (Translucent)
- Red (Translucent)
Of which there are no more of these shells available.

So that leaves me with pretty much one option, to re-create/re-produce the shells myself. So I began to look at factories in the UK that provide services for creating plastic products. My first thought was Plastic Injection Moulding as this would most probably give the best results for a case. I found a company Moorland Plastics, and sent them a quick email of what I want. They replied within the afternoon, explaining for me to be able to do this I would need moulds. They could create the moulds, but it's not going to be cheap.

So this has made things interesting. I also thought of the other option for creating plastic products, vac forming - which would still of course use a mould, but might be a little cheaper? This companies website say they can provide plastics with thickness of up to 1cm and in materials such as PVC and ABS.

I am still trying to look to find a suitable way of creating a mould for the PSX shell. I can acquire another 5502 to experiment with for not a lot of money, so if i ruin that I won't be too fussed. So thats why I am here, because I want to pick your brains as to what you think is a good way to do this.


In short I need the case to be the following:
- Translucent or of a colour of my choice
- Hard wearning, not flimsy
- Suitable to contain the components found inside a video games console
- Easy to fit

If it isn't viable for me to create the moulds myself, then I will simply have to look to something like plastic dye's but that limits my colour choices dramatically because I can only go "darker" and the console is already a dark grey.

3D printing may well be a viable option. I'd also look into mold making with the parts you have and casting shells in clear acrylic resins. You could mix small batches and cast just about any color, including swirls, using dyes compatible with the resin.

Try recreating it in CAD and send it to protocase to make? I don't think they do plastic though.