Project Stealthlow

[Waynio]

Well, whatever it is, I'm looking forward to it.

Thanks 88 .

Ah I think it may be the right time to work out where to put wire pass through holes & a guide for how to lay the cables out, I'm not doing a load of single wire pass throughs as seen in some other neat cable jobs I'll instead make big enough holes for the connectors to get through & make a good fitting cover that untightens a little so I can lift it up whenever I need to change things, I also want to include a way to have a wire mess hidden but accessible & functional under the hdd cages as there is some space for extras there.

Is it possible to make diy sata cables or open them up to extend them, anyone know about this? I found left angle sata cables but might need to mod the length to get it just perfect.

[Waynio]

Well, on with the show flow! +r

Cheers AmEv .

I saw a brief tutorial on modifying SATA cables a while ago...I'll see if I can find it again.

Thanks 88 I measured the furthest hdd position to the furthest sata port in the layout I want to do & it comes to 615mm so I should be fine with the left angle sata cables I ordered, also John on bit-tech pointed me in the direction of a tutorial for going diy on sata cables .

Got all the filling work done on the pci piece which has presented yet another new thing, rounded edges where I done the filling lol so yep that means I'll have to dedicate a bit more time to making the rounded edges consistant for the slots, anyway it took 3 layers of filling before I got a finish I can live with so just need to round the edges & paint then this piece is completed.

Showing it with the lian-li black vented pci brackets I bought & I feel this is going to look sweet once finished.

[Waynio]

I still need to figure out if I'm going to add a regular rear fan as I remember slightly regretting adding one to the air cube with the cpu cooler being in push/pull config so I have a tough decision on whether I should add a fan or cut out a spawling grill from the pci area to the spot where there is usually a fan, tough call but there is always the fan just above the io spot which would probably do the job fine, I'll take a bit more time to decide .

Pulling away to make the rounded edge I accidentally put in consistent.

Cut a little piece of wood to use as a sanding block to make the task much better & easier.

Made the edges 100% square & gave the edges that show a smoothed rounded edge, so now thank goodness this piece is ready for painting at last .

I was thinking of body filling all the lines where the plates connect to each other but don't feel the need to be honest because a: it will consume another day & b: it might end up a mess but I suppose I could use a filler primer which would be much easier & probably better.

And apologies for posting updates the minute I finish for the day even with fairly insignificant updates, hope it's not boring or irritating anyone lol.

[Waynio]

Looking good. I can't wait to see it with paint!

As for filling the lines, personally I think I would leave them the way they are. I think they add to the overall aesthetic.



Bah! That's what worklogs are for!

Thanks 88 yeah I think I'll skip filling the lines, I think I came out with the boring comment because the pci piece took so long to complete & was starting to bore me lol .

New jigsaw in action & the LED light helps big time, much smoother jigsaw than any I used before & didn't even need to clamp up like usual, yep it's a gooden for £30 .

PCI/IO cutout done.

PCI piece Attached.

Working on the 2nd level, never took any pics of the way I figured where the sata cables need to go through, this circle cutter scares the bleep outa me so I hide behind a big board in case it flys off .

Took ages to cut it out but got there.

Smoothed everything off & brushed both sides.

Wire management holes & need to file a small section away from the optical angle bar.

Only cut out the pci/io area on the back panel as I'm gonna ponda on what to do with the rest of it.

Very hard to see it but the hole is in perfect alignment with the psu fan & will catch the excess air flow from the hdd fans.

[Waynio]

Here is how I aligned the mounting holes for the psu, cotton bud sticks cut off ends, pressed into the mounting holes, put a blob of paint on & press against the back panel & pull away, spot drill, drill then countersink.

There was 2 unwanted holes back from when I tried a clamping system for the pci cards so I used a custom circle hex graph to try & align it correct but failed on that & then failed on not using a small drill bit at first & instead used 1 that was a tad too big so silly me went & drilled big holes to remove the botched area then took a break cursing like a gooden & generally feeling down thinking I'd have to order a new sheet or an iffy repair lol, even considered cutting out the entire bad area & trying to fit another cut to precise size & fitting inside the bad area & filling the edge.

Took a few hours to spot drill all these.

Anyway similar thing happened when I was doing the back panel mesh on the air cube so thought screw it I'll give it a shot & the following was 100% freestyle but is to be continued tomorrow as it was getting a bit late.

If after tomorrow I can't make it good I'll give in & get a new sheet.

[Waynio]

Here, I couldn't be bothered doing more than getting back to where I mucked up but I could just about be bothered to get a pic lol.

[Waynio]

Started 6 am Friday, finished 8 pm had a few quick coffee breaks.

Days like today make me remember why I make my own cases, the past few days I've been questioning why am I bothering doing this lol & the answer is in the pictures, the first botch up panel was one of those where I don't know what to make of it & wondered if I could grow to like it but todays effort I knew immediately I'm glad to say wooooooo .

OK so I missed out on taking pictures with the custom circle hex pattern I downloaded, printed from http://incompetech.com/graphpaper/ but I cut to size & stuck down with cello tape & marked the centre of each circle which tested my patience over a few sessions through the night lol but whenever it got too much I just watched a show to break the monotony & when it was done I covered it in cello tape so it all stays down & left until 6 am.

Not sure how long the spot drilling took but it was quite a while, then drilled a 3.2mm bit & then used a 7mm bit, then got my bigger countersink bit & accidentally went too deep on the first one so did all the rest at the same depth & pretty fast I noticed it was a good accident for 2 reasons: 1 it adds a nice & easier way for the air to get through, 2 I think it looks pretty damn good.

The circle at the bottom I wasn't sure if I should go with a plain hole or do the mesh so I went with the mesh & had to just use a few 3.2mm holes for the ones closest to the edge of the wanted circle, not a bad result I think .

Flipped the piece over & done slight countersinks on the exterior side, then used wd40 to get the tacky cello tape completely off & then used the satinising mop to minimise scratches & then went over it with a fine satinising mop, dusted down & installed back to the case & wow I love it when I impress myself & feels a fair while since I done that, so then enough blah blah & enjoy the pics .

Awesome day .

[Waynio]

So you want to keep the brushed metal look? That's easy!

Have it powder coated with clear. You can use clear powder coating over any raw metal. You can also add pearls, metal flake, etc. There must be someone around you that can do powder coating.

http://www.eastwood.com/hotcoat-powd...r-powders.html

This video shows how you can polish something and then do some artwork using decals. They polished a bat and then added some color but for your case you would just get the metal brushed and then clean it and powder coat it clear. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3yBf-cPHs7o

There is also one other way -
If you have an automotive paint store go in and tell them what you are doing. They can show you some things. Ask them about using just the "toner". It's not clear but it comes in lots of colors. It's fairly transparent so you could keep the brushed look and spray a cool color over it and the brush markings still show through. Then you can clear coat that and it would look awesome.

Thanks for opening another option BS, I had no idea there was clear powder coating , had me looking around to find out what I'd need to setup a powder coating system & it's all fine except for making my own oven lol I could do that but it'd keep bumping up the cost of the build but on the other hand it could be a very good investment, I even came across candy powders not many colours though but still I only thought there was just solid colours for powder coating, thanks again for opening my eyes to an alternative +rep.

Actually, if YOU find out about one, let me know and I'll start to stock it at work - we regularly get people who want to clear bare metal and we just don't have a product designed for it.

We do have a waterclear plastic primer which is, effectively, a mild etch but I have no idea if it'd work at all on metal - I'm assuming it wont do jack as I'd assume any etch for metal would be acid based whereas any etch for plastic would be based on some kind of chemical reaction with the plastic.

Here is a few I found through a sleepless night of searching .

Universal Adhesion Promoter U-POL Aerosol Grip#4 (I've seen the price of this one vary from £8.50 to £17 )
http://www.autopaintsbrighton.co.uk/...50ml-235-p.asp

VHT ADHESION PROMOTER (sounds like good stuff but is for very high temperatures but dunno if that matters tbh)
http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/VHT-ADHESION-P...item3a5d540c93

Adhesion Promoter and Sealer
http://flowkochem.com/clear.php

Dupli-Color/11 oz. clear adhesion promoter
http://www.autozone.com/autozone/acc...ntifier=460112
http://www.amazon.com/ADHESION-PROMO.../dp/B0007UAXJQ

Ideally I want to clear prime parts, then use candy paint & then a matt or satin lacquer, want to avoid gloss , it's still possibly weeks away but it would be good to get it all sorted out so theres not any waiting, I'll be buying a spray gun too for doing the candy & clear coat.

[Waynio]

Update

Ok so I mounted the psu & mobo for figuring out where the cable holes will go.

Drilled 10mm holes so I could get a square file in & make the holes, they look square & ugly but I have a plan for making them all very very neat but I'll save that for a later update.

Then took the bottom panel off to add the feet & was going to measure & mark but there was markings left behind from the begining of the project woo hoo so I opted for the points on the corners so the bolts will overlap where the corner support bars are but I chose to use countersunk bolts instead of the ones that came with the feet as I wanted them out of the way, they were way too long so I grinded them down.

Feet on .

So I got the wire pass holes made, shortened the curve bar supports, expanded the optical angle bar so sata data & power cables will go through both now, cut to length a perfect length wire for the cpu power & atx power as a first step of the prep for sleeving, installed the feet Bill sponsored me with.

Doesn't feel like much progress for almost a full day but progress is progress .

Thank you for sponsoring me Bill, the feet are awesome & the Modmen show is too .

[Waynio]

OK time for some MDPC sleeving .

Being new to a full on sleeving job, a quick google her a quick goolgle there & BAM.

How to remove an ATX plug
http://forums.bit-tech.net/showthread.php?t=64632

Snipped the heatshrink, cable tie & sleeving off the corsair ax850 atx cable.

Then went & gathered pliers, wire stripper, the crimping tool I got from MDPC in all it's matt black glory & my ridiculasly huge disposable lighter my bro bought me for christmas & isn't even half way used since christmas lol .

Got a paper clip straightened out & tried using it but was too thick soooo, I took it to the garage, snipped it in half & grinded it so it was nice & thin.

Tested it & it does the job of removing pins awesome, instead of pressing it against the ground I held it tight in the pliers to push it the extra needed amount, first attempt & it came out perfectly, so so much for this psu being difficult hehe , still though I'll need to dig out an exacto blade so I can heat it up to cut the sleeving well.

Nils awesome trademark custom cartoon picture .

40 metres of black sleeving for single wires & I think 10 metres of sata sleeving too, 150 pre-cut heatshrink pieces, a nice length of heatshrink, a pile of pins, a load of cable clip pieces of all the available sizes, enough sata power pass through pieces & a few sata power end pieces, that is all I think .

I might only do the CPU cable & the ATX cable tonight but it's on .