Monster Khaos

[Wag]

Phew, sorry it's been so long for an update. Real life calls once in a while you know ;-)

Anyway, I have a somewhat short update today starting with paint for the front of the case.

I ended up going with black for the round hole mesh around the power buttons and on the bracket for the actual switching mechanism.

The Sheet metal plate gets a few coats of orange to provide contrast.

After the paint dries, I finally get to assemble some ofthe parts to give me a better idea of what the front of the case will end up looking like.

I don't have the nuts and bolts tightened quite yet. I've still got a few little finishing touches to some of these parts before they can be assembled permanently. I just couldn't help but put it all together once to get a good look.

Behind the grill is a 120mm ACRyan orange fan with leds. It should provide a nice glow out the front of the case.

Here you can see the back plate where I still have to add in the switching mechanisms to the bracket. Currently there are only 2 bolts holding the plate in place and they are both on the bottom. Once the switching mechanism is complete I'll be adding a bead of hot glue to the top edge to hold the rest of it in place. Realistically the bolts will likely be plenty to hold it, but I want to make sure the entire thing is secure.

Unfortunately, I don't have much else to report. I've got a lot of work to do the inside of the case still and all of the acrylic needs to be installed for the windows. The drive bays will also be a bit of a chore and I'm trying to decide if I should splurge and get some Lian-Li hard drive bays and add them in for convenience. It's hard to justify the cost on such a crappy case. We'll see i guess.

Here are a couple of parting shots.

Until next time...

[Wag]

The devil is in the details guys. I just couldn't help myself but assemble it and see how its comming together. Initially the matte against the shiny plastic really stuck out. Its been sitting in the shop and had gotten rather dusty. I wiped it down once with a dry rag before assembly but it really needs to get a good scrubbing which should help a little.

The ring around the outside is actually rubber so the entire grill is not 100% plastic. I've been considering paintint it, as I have a a little bit of my gloss black left, but haven't decided yet. I'm not sure how well the rubber ring will hold the paint. It dosen't have to bend or flex at all after final assembly, but I don't want it to get old an start flaking off either.

If I do end up painting it won't be until after I get the drive bay covers finished. They are going to incorporate actual Monster: Khaos cans which I expect will radically change the character of the front of the case. They are one of the next thigns on the agenda to finish up before I start working on the inside of the case.

[Wag]

Whew!

The dust has settled at work.... finally. On the sad side of things, even with all the extra hours I had to put in (at my projects expense no less!) my workplace had to downsize its staff. My position is no longer.

Not to worry tho, I was getting pretty burnt out after all those extra hours anyway. I've got a few leads on a new job already, and in the meantime i'm going to enjoy myself and get a few more projects done.

Starting with the Monster!

So after these couple months of inactivity on the case you can pretty much imagine how things looked...

So before I coudl start back in, I wanted to make everything shiny and pretty again. Bust out the soap and rags...

While I let those parts dry out again I got to work on my Drive Bay Covers. Pretty simple stuff. Just a cut up Monster can glued to one of the existing (painted) drive bay covers from the original case. That was then covered with a piece of acrylic with two bolts to affix the acrylic to the cover. This results in a nice smooth surface instead of the aluminum surface of the can alone.

A few days ago I had to finish up painting some of the remaining odds and ends of the case. Most notably, the drive bays. I opted for black instead of orange. Unfortunately, my hobby shop was out of any more of the same orange color and I wasn't willing to wait 2 weeks due to the job search.

The black actually does provide a very nice contrast to the orange interior of the case.

Another little annoying part was permanently affixing the power switches to my bracket. I ended up having to drill a couple of new holes and then hot gluing the switching mechanism into place. The actual push buttons had to be carefully filed down slightly to make them fit perfectly. If they were too tight, they would not push.

After that, I couldn't resist temporarily assembling a few panels of the case to get a taste of what it may look like when reassembled.

There is no acrylic in there yet. I should get that cut and fitted in this weekend at some point so you can expect another update within the next couple days. I'll also be working on the sleeving for the cables as well. Its all pretty simple stuff, but i haven't managed to find my sleeving kit and don't want to buy a new one. I know its in the shop somewhere. I'm sure it will turn up at some point.

Also, I'll be needing to install the case lighting and feet. These are two things I actually need to purchase still. Luckily they are some of the easiest parts to finish.

Oh, and if you're wondering, I did actually inform my brother of his birthday present. Its only 2 months late at this point. He said he would build a completely new computer just to do the case justice ;-)

Thanks for the patience guys!

[Wag]

Ok, its 3:56 in the morning (according to my watch at least) and I have some big news. The case..... is DONE.

Unfortunately, I'm tired, shaky, and can't take pictures worth crap right now... Sooo tired.....

So I'll finish up the formal worklog tomorrow. Thanks for everyones patience (especially my brother who is the recipient of this case!)

I did manage to take one picture that didn't completely suck. Yes, it is the real top of the case... in the dark... under its own lighting.

[Wag]

Ok guys, the last movement of this symphony is beginning. Hope you all enjoyed the show and sorry that it slowed down there for quite a while. Lets just say that loosing your job doesn't necessarily mean that you'll have a lot of free time, and when expensive things break, you think twice about how badly you need it...

Anyway, here we go!

First things first, I dug out my old orange cold cathode from way back. I knew I had one sitting around and wanted to make sure it was the right color and size for the application.

Looks like it will work just fine.

While assembling the top of the case, i knew I would have very little clearance over the power supply. This was going to cause issues for the lettering over the top. Not only that, but some of the supports on the windowless side of the case were going to be in the way of my cathode. I didn't want to, but some trimming had to be done with the dremel to make everything fit.

You'll also notice that the metal front has a notch cut in it as well. Thats my fault for not measuring properly and cutting the "KHAOS" in the top too far to the edge. The back also needed to be trimmed as well.

As long as I had a little bare metal showing, I took my black permanent marker and touched upthe spots with silver showing thru. I know that no one will ever see it, but it made me feel better.

Then there was the issue of the window itself. Since it was at the top and wasn't going to have the greatest "view" of the inside of the case, I experimented with a few different options. The one that seemed to give me the best light distribution over the lettering was a "frosted" plexi which basically means I sanded the heck out of one side with an orbital sander until it was barely translucent but scattered the light nicely.

A bunch of double stick tape later and the plexi was in.

The power supply will still interfere somewhat with the light where the "K" and "H" are, but there is enough light to make things pretty clear.

Here you can see how much clearance the cathode actually gets inside the case. It's tucked way up in the corner and I am a little concerned about things getting warm up there, but I did include a switch for the cathode in the back if it ever starts reacting to the heat.

I neglected to take a picture of the "M" panel and the acrilic install on there. Lets just say it was very straightforward and simple. It went on without a hitch.

After more sanding and dremeling on the drive bay covers, I was finally able to remove the protective wrapping from the plexi and get them installed.

Finally I could assemble the whole case.

Although they don't match perfect, I did pick up a pair of orange thumbscrews for the "M" panel side of the case.

To be honest, the front and rear fans were something of a disappointment due to them having "blacklight" LED's instead of orange or white ones to accent the transparent orange color of the fans. Although, once they are spinning they do manage to make the orange stick out pretty well. All in all, I'm pretty happy with them.

My brother has informed me that he will be building a completely new system for this case, so I'll be leaving the top drive bay open for the time being.

I'll conclude with some more "finished" shots in the next post.

[Wag]

kris, I have uploaded two new copies of the "KHAOS" picture to my server. they are both in a lot higher resolution for you if you wish to use them for desktop backgrounds.

You can find them here:
http://www.ghostobservance.com/uploa....1680x1050.jpg
http://www.ghostobservance.com/uploa....1600x1200.jpg

[Wag]

Ok, so these are all just "glamor" shots of the case. Nothing really exciting as I'm no professional photographer. Hope you enjoy!

Thanks again to everyone!


Link To Original Worklog