Casemod Project: "Strobe" - Building new case from scratch

Alright, now pictures about the new spacers going in front of the case. Original spacers are made out of 5mm aluminium. Since the case fans will now draw air in from the front of the case, I had to make the gap between the front frame and front plate bigger, to allow better airflow. My initial plan was to double the gap from 5mm to 10mm. However, I found a piece of 15mm x 60mm aluminium rod from my messy exemplary organised material storage. I also had some trial and error left over pieces of 15x15mm aluminium rod, so I ended up increasing the air gap from 5mm to 15mm. Those 15x15mm alu pieces are from when I was making the new braces to replace some of the joints made out of L-profile. Mistakes were made while making threads to them, but now they will have new purpose. :slight_smile:

In picture bellow there is 5, 10 and 15 alu rods side by side.

Old spacers next to new ones.

Chunk of alu attached to the front frame.

Tapping some threads. Previously I never used any lubricant while tapping the threads, but my dad suggested that I could try regular dish washing soap. It worked much better than I could have ever anticipated! I was careless while applying the soap, so for a while the whole piece smelt lemon fresh. :wink:

Since I didn’t have long enough countersink screws, I had to get creative. I had regular socket head screws with long enough threads, so I decided to try and countersink those socket head screws. It actually worked out really well. To countersunk M4 socket head screws I first drilled the 4mm hole for the bolt, and after that used 7mm drill bit and drilled maybe 5-6mm deep to the 4mm hole. Here’s the results

For the top spacer I used little bit shorter screws, so I had to sink them deeper.

Testing if the screw holes align with the front plate.

And now for the exhausting part. I had to cut and file away big chunks of material from the bottom spacer, so that it would fit to the case. First I drilled some holes to make the job easier.

And the pieces are off!

After that it was time for the tedious file work. I managed to get the lower spacer done, and it turned out great! I also drilled two extra screw holes to make sure the bottom spacer is secured well enough to the front frame.

Before and after shot. :slight_smile:

And finally how the spacers look when attached to the front frame. I tested out if I could sand the case using regular sanding paper, hence why the surface of the front frame and fan bracket look like that.

Here is also better picture of how the fan bracket turned out. Forgot to post this picture earlier. :slight_smile:

More later

9 Likes

Can I pay you to make me one?

/s

2 Likes

TBH I was thinking this few days ago, but I have no idea how much money this would be worth. First thing I’d need is my own sweatshop workshop. All the panels could be CNC’d, maybe the spacers as well.


If someone wants to use the ideas from my project or wants to try to replicate the whole damn thing I wouldn’t mind at all. Just go for it! I can try to help anyway I can. :slight_smile:

5 Likes

In original layout the PSU was located on top of the CPU, which prevented me from using any tower coolers. At first my plan was to try to place the regular ATX power supply to the bottom of the case, but after taking some measurements I realised that plan would require me to make big changes to entire case. Big enough that it would have been more convenient to just build new case.

Since the SFX size power supplies are much more common, and there are some solid units available, I decided to make room for smaller PSU at the bottom of the case. I knew SFX power supplies are small, but I didn’t realise just how small they are.

I ended up buying Corsair SF600, the platinum version. It had semi passive fan, it is fully modular, and it came with ATX to SFX mounting adaptor. Adaptor was important because I was able to use it as a template when cutting the opening for the PSU.

I didn’t take that many pictures when making the opening. Process was pretty straight forward: Draw the lines, drill some holes, cut the opening with jig saw, finish it with a file.

Old motherboard is used to make sure I didn’t cut the PSU opening too high. :stuck_out_tongue:

I also made opening to the back plate. I used the opening that I cut to the case frame as a template to see where the opening should be in the back panel. Then I just estimated how big the opening should be.

Spoiler alert! My estimation was little off… :smiley:

Here you can see the bottom screws holes used to secure the PSU to the case are inaccessible. Top screws are also little bit hard to get to, but since the PSU isn’t that heavy, I’m confident two screws in the middle are more than enough to keep the PSU in it’s place.

I will enlarge the opening to the back panel next time I have access to my fathers workshop. Maybe. I’m still debating with my self if I should make bigger spacers to the back of the case as well. Now there’s 15mm gap at the front, and only 5mm gap in the back. I’ll keep the case as it is on my desk and see if it starts to annoy me. Even if I decide to keep the 5mm gap in the back I might still redo the bottom spacer, since as you can see, some old screw holes caused some unwanted defects to the spacer. :confused:

Lastly, here’s how the case looks with the PSU in place. I also covered the old ATX PSU opening with same mesh I used at the top of the case. I didn’t bother to modify the existing ATX PSU opening in any way, since it does not really matter what kind of opening there is. If I change my mind again I can always put regular ATX power supply back in there. :stuck_out_tongue:

7 Likes

Excellent work, especially using basic hand and power tools. It is amazing what a dedicated person without a milling machine can make. Keep up the great work!

3 Likes

Thanks! Only power tools I’ve used thus far are my cordless drill, jig saw, and drill press.

I was actually thinking if I should take pictures from my tools and try to make some kind of list of the tools I use. I just ran out of time when I was in the workshop, but I could just lay all my tools on my apartment floor. I can fit most of my stuff in one big toolbox. :smiley:

3 Likes

I have wanted to do a case out of wood. I think it would still be quite the undertaking, even with an easier material. I am very impressed with your craftsmanship. Should I decide to take the plunge, I will probably hit you up for advise.

A tool list would be neat to see.

2 Likes

Easiest (and most expensive) approach is getting alu-extrusions.
Shameless plug for my own project

3 Likes

Oh, I agree. I like any project where folks are making their own stuff. It is just not something you see that often. I will certainly check out your thread!

3 Likes

I might start my own “Even’s random blog” thread at some point and put tool list in there.

Here’s a picture of what my tool box holds currently.

Other tools that are missing from the picture includes a hack saw, my file set. my jig saw, drill press, some extra clamps, eye protection and other general miscellaneous tool I don’t bother carrying with me.

Not bad idea. Just remember to use dry wood. Temperature inside the computer case can get toasty, so if the wood isn’t properly dried it might flex or crack under quick temperature changes. Just something that comes to mind regarding wood. :slight_smile:

Something to get you inspired: http://slipperyskip.com/index.html

:wink:

7 Likes

I like your handwriting. It’s very artistic

2 Likes

Thanks! My teachers used to say my handwriting is messy. :smile:

You might also notice my mixed usage of Finnish and English while marking up stuff. :stuck_out_tongue:

1 Like

This is how the SSDs were mounted earlier. Just 1mm thick plate with some screw holes in it.

Since the space is now occupied by the lower 120mm fan, I had to make new bracket / holder for the SSDs. I wanted to be able to have total of four 2.5 inch drives in my case, to have room for any additional drives I might get. Currently I already have 3 Samsung SSDs in my workstation.

I used 40x15mm L-profile and 3mm aluminium plate to make the holder for the drives.

The difficult part was to get the screw holes align with each other. I first thought if I actually need to make more than one bracket for the SSD drives. They don’t weigh much so I could just attach them from the other side. Just to play it safe I did make bracket for the other side as well.

And how it looks inside the case. The holder is attached to the same screw holes that used to be for the 120mm fans located that the bottom of the case. This way I can rotate the holder to any direction I want.

And lastly some testing with the actual hardware. Fans, cables etc. are still missing. I will post pictures about that later. :slight_smile:

10 Likes

if this isnt’ playing ghouls n ghosts + ghosts n stuff 't the end I’ll be dissapointed.

2 Likes

Ghouls and ghosts most likely not, unless I start goofing around with emulators.

ghosts n stuff? Absolutely! :mouse:

3 Likes

Are you tracking how much you are spending in dollars in terms of materials?

2 Likes

I did, but it’s becoming more and more difficult to count how much I’ve spent. Actually not a bad idea, I now got interested how much I’ve sunk to this thing :smile:

I’ll look around online how much aluminium costs and calculate some rough estimate.

3 Likes

Ok so I did the math, which will cause visible confusion every time I say this to my friends I’m not good at math

I also haven’t slept that well recently so sleep deprivation might also have a play in my calculations.

Aluminium for the whole case: 67€
Screws, nuts, bolts, etc: 30€
Other shiz: 15€

TOTAL: 112€

Total costs are for the case in the current shape, not counting in the costs my mistakes happy accidents and changes in plans have caused. If you wana add that throw extra 20-30€ in.

Note that for screws, nuts etc. I always buy in bulk, meaning I might get M4 8mm countersink screws for 200 pcs even if I will only use 20 of said screws in my case. Last time I bought screws was years ago, and I can’t really remember how much I paid for them. All screws I buy are always stainless steel if available.

For aluminium, 3mm aluminium sheets used in this build were pre cut to exact size. Well, “exact” is a loos term since the pieces were not perfectly square, and this caused all sorts of problems later on. That is why 2mm and 1mm aluminium is from one single sheet that I use when I need. That way I can also make sure sheets I cut are square enough.

So long story short I don’t remember how much the pre cut sheets cost, but I tried to take that into account while calculating costs.

Other aluminium pieces like that 500mm long 15x60mm chunk of aluminium might have been some left over piece that I found while at the scrap yard, where I buy my aluminium. The guy who owns the place usually gives good discount on left overs and scrap pieces. :slight_smile:

Oh, and how many Americans?

image

I don’t know how good Google is with currency conversion, but oh well :man_shrugging: :smile:

Bonus for @Goalkeeper since you liked my handwriting :slight_smile:

I’ll try to find time and post short update soon.

10 Likes

My name is on paper. :slight_smile:

6 Likes

Cost tracking is a pain. Nice breakdown you did there^^

I know that calculator… In fact, I have one.

2 Likes