Rockin Case

[SXRguyinMA]

Alright, this mod took off one day after browsing some cool rigs over at modshop.net. I've done my own modding on my Armor case so far, added LCS and other goodies, but thats for another thread. Me and the Fiance (soon to be wife - Aug 30th) were sittin at the comp. one night and were thinkin what we could put a computer in. She was playin her guitar at the time, and we both looked at each other and it clicked! A GUITAR!
So we started brainstorming and I dug out an old mobo with a PIII 500MHz ready to go. Just need the basics, a cheap PSU, CD drive, floppy, etc. This computer is going to be far from a top notch gaming rig. She's a writer, so this comp will be hers for writing, etc. so it doesnt need to be high-powered.

So heres the details so far. All that is done as of right now is a crappy MS paint drawing lol.

As you can see, the base I'm going to hand lay from carbon fiber. I've got a roll of cloth and resin and have some basic fiberglassing skills so I'm going to give it a shot. This is where the mobo and everything will mount to. I'm also going to make the decorative pick guard out of carbon, and maybe a few other details/drive mounts etc. as well.

The body of the guitar is going to be translucent green acrylic with some LED lighting, not sure on the details on that yet. The PSU will mount under the sound hole, so the PSU exhaust will blow up through the hole.

The mobo will sit at the bottom of the guitar, with all the I/O connections coming out of the bottom, so when its finished and sitting on a guitar stand we'll be able to run the cables under and behind it.

The bridge, neck and head will all be made out of red translucent acrylic. We're going to put the frets in as well, just not sure what we'll use for material on them, either actualy guitar string or possibly something else.

We plan on using small diameter acrylic rod for the strings themselves, which will have LEDs in the bottoms for power, HDD, CD avtivity, etc. So when the LEDS light up the entire "string" will light up.

I've never worked with acrylic before, but I have read through the "working with acrylic" thread on this site and I learned a lot, so I'm jsut going to order some up, and plenty of extra, and have at it! The carbon will be simple, I've got fiberglass and carbon experience already, so its just a matter of finding a perfectly smooth flat surface to lay the cloth and resin down on.

This build will take some time, as we just moved into a new apartment and funds are really tight, but I wanted to at least start the thread with the idea layed out, and update it as funds allow.

Thanks to everyone here for their creations and gettin gme motivated to try this!

Will

[SXRguyinMA]

thanks! We're tossing the idea around of possibly having the cd drive/hard drive in a separate enclosure that would look like a small amp/speaker setup. Know anyone that lengthens IDE cables? The power cables I can do myself, but the IDEs are a little trickier. If not then I'll have to make up some carbon fiber drive mounts

Where in the area are you?

Will

[XcOM]

IDe cables max length is 45cm without a booster, but this is not recommended as the longer you get the greater the chance of signal degradation, i have used cables rated for 80cm before, yes they worked but i did see a loss in peformance, your best bet would be scsi or sata as i do belive that scsi technally dosent have a max length and sata is stupidly long i think.


Edit for googlefu:
Correction, google has thrown up some strange results, some say 40" some say 36", so about that range for sata,

and scsi is as i thought, techneally unlimited, but in the real world about 80" is your limit with Scsi Ultra's

[FuzzyPlushroom]

SATA might actually be doable, if you get a PCI card for it, or eventually upgrade to a board which has external SATA ports. A three-foot range wouldn't be bad, but you could royally screw things up if you unplugged the "amp" with the computer running.

I'm in southern New Hampshire (Cheshire County), about 15-20 minutes from the Mass. border.

[SXRguyinMA]

::UPDATE::

I got a steal on a new mobo/cpu/vga bundle, so I've upgraded from my SOYO/P3 500MHz/noname vga/SODIMM memory:

to this ECS mobo w/athlon 2600+, PNY GeForce vga and 1512MB DDR mem

I got the combo for $45 shipped, so I'd say I got a good deal. I know it works, It used to be the MOBO in the server that hosts www.tlzone.net. They upgraded to something faster, and I scored this

In other news, I should hopefully be able to start getting some carbon fiber layed this weekend. If its nice out I'll be out on the jet ski, so we'll see

Stay Tuned
Will

[SXRguyinMA]

::UPDATE::

Got some cash for some goodies I sold, so this project is back on track! Placed my order Saturday with delvies plastics, got all the acrylic I need and then some (for screwing-up lol). I've been reading up on the web about working with acrylic, so I'm going to have a go at it.

I've got most of the components for the PC itself, just need a PSU, a few cables, and keyboard/mouse, monitor. I found a 3.5" floppy drive with built-in media card reader in it. I decided to keep a 3.5" due to her using it as a writng machine mostly. I have my old 40GB WD HDD out of my old rig that will work perfectly in this one.

I'm planning on starting on the carbon fiber work for the backplate tonight, I'll post more pics then

Will

[SXRguyinMA]

Ok, got the first stage of the carbon backplate done today. I made the fiance help (its gong to be her rig after all) and we busted it out pretty quickly. I didnt have enough carbon to do 3 layers for strength, but I had enough for 2 and enough fiberglass for the middle layer, so it worked out well. It was all perfectly sized to give an extra 2-3" on each side from the drawnig I made up, which took demensions from her Guild acoustic guitar (the inspiration for this mod).

It doesnt looks great yet, but once it hardens we'll give it a thorough wet sanding on both sides, followed by another coat of resin then more wet sanding until the finish is perfect. So thats anough jibber jabber for now, on to the pics!!!

The goodies - Bondo resin, latex gloves, 99 cent walmart paintbrushes, a rag and cleaner to clean the plexi prior to applying the resin

Dry run with the fiberglass on top of the first layer of carbon

carbon and fiberglass next to each other

and skip ahead a few steps (had to work fast, resin only stays liquid so long lol) all layers together, smoothed as best I could before it got too stiff to work with

and a few close-ups

Like I said, finish looks like sh*t right now, but once its wet sanded and resined and wet sanded again it'll look much better

[SXRguyinMA]

ok did some more work tonight, added 2 more layers of glass and 1 more carbon, this should be plenty stiff enough

Ok kiddies...this is todays resin mixing lesson! Always use less hardener than you think you need...otherwise you get 4 mns and you get this :

and since I already had it poured on but not spread, I had to do the best I could with what I had...still could have come out much worse

Looks like a $75 sheet of peanut brittle. Luckily this is saveable. I'm going to let it cure for a few days, then break out a 2x4 and the 120 grit and go to town. I'm going to sand right through the carbon everywhere theres a bump, so needless to say I'm going to need another sheet. This last 24"x50" sheet cost me $33 with shipping.
So I'll sand her down this weekend, and once I get another slab of carbon I'll do a final layer to pretty it up and noone will ever know...except me...and all you guys
I pulled it off, its hardened anough already, and its definitely much stiffer. If it wasnt for the bumps it'd be time to trim, but such is life.
On the other hand, I got a UPS confirmation today, my acrylic will be here on Aug 6th! 22lbs of goodness from www.delviesplastics.com

Stay tuned

[SXRguyinMA]

alright, carbon is completely sanded, awaiting funds for another sheet of 2x2 twill and another quart of resin.

in other news, got the guitar shape traced to the plexi, now just laying out the ocmponents and tracing to find the best fit for everything. I have a lot less room than I had expected, but thats life.

anyone ever had any problems with extending wires from the PSU? I'm thinking I'll put the PSU into the "amp" box to save room in the case itself. this will also help keep the heat down. but I'm goign to need to extend the PSU wires by at least 1-2 feet. I'm good with soldering and such, so thats not an issue, just wondering if it'll push the current that far.

I was originally going to get a modular PSU to keep it clean, but I may just get a regular one now that it's going to be in its own case. Will post pics/more info as things happen

[SXRguyinMA]

ok carbons here, should be able to do it up this weekend

also, thanks to the helpful people on this forum, I downloaded Google SketchUp and after 90 mins of messin around I ended up with this:

that should give a better idea of how its going to be laid out. the components (mobo, PSU, VGA, memory) came from this site, so a huge thanks to those who created those components originally