A Rough Design

[Lancelot59]

So after getting my initial questions answered I started taking the plans for my first case mod from the inside of my head and putting them on paper. This is a really rough image of what I want to do and NOT TO SCALE, and it's just a general layout from the side:

The cable retainers keep all the wires and such contained including the water cooling lines. It could be a grill type setup

Having the radiator on the top in a separate shroud cover gives me the ability to screw a duct on top during the summer so it doesn't heat up my room. I might even put some other accessories up there but what those are remains to be seen. The reservoir cage is gonna have a "blast door" in front of it to cover up an acrylic window through which the reservoir is going to sit.

The optical drives are going to be covered with sliding doors similar to those on a Mac Pro. I took these pictures of the sliding door mechanism of a machine sitting in the animation room at school. The teacher wouldn't let me open it up so I couldn't see the spring mechanism. But I do know kind of how it works. The only thing is that the Mac drives don't have a huge cover on the front of the drive tray, and that would jam it. But those are easy to remove. But I need a look at the mechanism from the back.

Comments and ideas are welcome. The biggest challenge right now is finding a base case to disassemble and use for it. It's a somewhat large size and I don't have much shop experience...well none really. So making a frame would be a challenge.

[J-Roc]

You cant see the mecanisim from the backside. There is a tin cover that goes over it. I'm sure it can be removed with force but it might be holding the springs.

But from close inspection on my mac case, there are two lobes attached by a hinge on a slide track. The front of the cd tray makes contact with the little lobes and pushes the piece down the track.

[Lancelot59]

That sounds like it would be hard to make...I wonder if I could get my hands on them separately from a supplier.