Righty!
This is my second ever project - first ever worklog, My wonderful partner has been kind enough to give me her OLD minitower case (I think it's a Yeong Yang one) It's seriously about 10 years old!!
It's large enough to take an ATX motherboard, has 2 x 5.25" bays, 3 x 3.5" bays and is still small enough so that It'd be really portable (there's even room for a watercooling kit!!)
The case panel is one piece (top and sides all come off together) which won't really favour a window (plastic will most likely get scratched up by the chassis). Since the PSU sits vertically, there isn't much of a view inside anyway.
I was thinking of putting a 120mm LED intake fan in place of the old 80mm and modding the bezel as follows:
Making a faceplate with acrylic (heat bent to fit the contours) that's covered with chrome auto film so that light from the fan and activity LED's comes through only when switched on (kinda like that shuttle with the LCD display that shines through the mirror front)
Cutting intakes on the bezel's sides (as the intake currently is crap!) to get some air through there (as the front faceplate's going to be solid "mirror") I'm also considering the option of cutting a 120mm hole right through the mirror too and mounting a mirrored plate on standoffs to cover the opening (and let more air through)... still thinking about it
Making stealthed drive bay covers to match contour
Adding USB and firewire ports in the bezel as well as relocating power switch (maybe a polished up vandal switch??) and relocating activity LED's.
I was also thinking about maybe putting a blowhole in the top? might be awkward getting the case panel on/off with a fan cable dangling around. recessed case handles, fancy case feet, thumbscrews for easy installation of everything and maybe some creative lighting on the front - would appreciate any suggestions
And of course - goes without saying - slick (well as slick as i can manage anyway ) pimp paintjob. Thinking mirror black or metal flake black perhaps to go with the shiny chrome bezel.
EDIT: to save you poor people having to read through 1 or so pages, here's some final pics early on






(more at the end )
Just look at what I started with though!

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Okay! first thing's first - let's have a bit of a look at this beautiful beige bezel
(aplogies for the bad quality pics - camera doesn't like close ups too much):

The FDD bay, will be filled in and as for the raised characters for activity LED's - they've gotta go! As do the raised parts of the power button text and flange

After a little elbow grease (plus sandpaper) it came out nice(r)

Inside the Bezel, things are rather ugly though:

This puppy's in need of some gutting out - first in line, pull out the LEDs and their respective cables - they were all anchored with hot glue - easy removal!!

Now to the rest of the back side - The FDD bay inset is annoying me, so I'll get rid of the plastic lump and the mounting pegs to free up some room just in case I wanna put anything there later:

from: to:

Next part, the power button

The 2 highlighted pegs don't do anything and i think that they might get in the way, Also, I can't see them being used for much (there's screw holes in the chassis, but they're in behind the drive cage - and weren't used anyway) - so off they come!

finito!

EDIT: I'm unsure whether or not to use the current switch housing - will leave it in until I decide on what to do with it

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Sweeet project.... Keep up the great work.

thats one big speaker.. turn that around and play some tunes while modding. lol

looks like you have this project well planned out, and it looks like it would be a good lan rig cause of size.

---EDIT---
it would be cool if you cut a hole in the side of the case the same size and location as the psu you put in there so it cools your psu better like an air duct...obviously get a filter too.
just an idea.

Quote: Originally Posted by beachbum86 thats one big speaker.. turn that around and play some tunes while modding. lol looks like you have this project well planned out, and it looks like it would be a good lan rig cause of size. ---EDIT--- it would be cool if you cut a hole in the side of the case the same size and location as the psu you put in there so it cools your psu better like an air duct...obviously get a filter too. just an idea.

That's a cool idea! I'll have to flip the PSU over though (the intake would ordinarily be facing towards the CPU) I guess modding the back panel will be called for
The PSU that was originally in there didn't have an intake fan (mind you, it was only a 125V one - but remember it's old!)

Yeah, the speaker's pretty sick Killer bass!!

The lan rig thing was an idea that I'd been carrying from the start (this was actually my girlfriend's lan setup back then!!!)

I've run across a few cases of similar design. Just two quick ideas I came up with: 1. I usually cut out as much plastic as I can off the bottom of the case's front bezel to allow more air to enter there. Of course having feet on the case is a must, and doesn't do any good if you set your case on carpet. 2. My first rig that was in the GHZ range had the PSU pulling air out and the HSF blowing down. They were fighting each other. I replaced the stock HSF with a Volcano 7 (this was 4 years ago now) which dropped temps a little, but I flipped the fan to exhaust off the sink and BAM a full 10C off my temps.I also modded the PSU by cutting the intake port it had near the cpu open, and replaced the cheesey fan with an 80mm Sunon. I don't recommend opening your PSU if you don't know what you are doing though. Even if it is unplugged the capacitors can still hold a charge for a while.

EDIT- For the top blowhole, you can cut a piece of flat aluminum (any good hardware store) or some kind of metal that isn't flimsy into strips. Screw or rivet them in place in the top of the frame and mount the fan to it. You could put the lid on and reach through the drive bays to trace that outline, then use the fan or a stencil to trace the actual hole. I did something like that to mount an intake fan to my mobo tray behind the right side panel. I didn't like the idea of having wires going to the panel either.

Dude - thanks for the awesome input - top blowhole idea is wicked and I'm definitely keen on doing it now!!

I was thinking of cutting some slits in the bezel's side and base to improve airflow (might backlight them with LED's too?) Case feet - DEFINITELY!! Perhaps those sunbeamtech LED ones.

As with the PSU, I've modded one before - will flip the PSU over, change out the intake fan for a purdy one and cut a hole in the side panel to let the air through

Got that same case here in my room.

I decided to have a go at creating the fascia of the case (I haven't done anything with acrylic before apart from cutting windows) - went to my local glass shop and picked up 2 pieces (just in case I kooked one) of 3mm clear acrylic - It was way cheaper than I'd guessed at 4 bucks (US$2) per piece
I want to have the acrylic follow the contour of the bezel - so I thought I'd give heat bending a go. Not having a heatgun posed a bit of a problem though - but I thought I'd give it a go regardless:
First thing was to make sure that the acrylic and the bezel were going to line up square while bending - I'm not that big a fan of freaky crooked angles in my design so I decided to tape a steel rule and an old drive bay cover to the sides of the bezel creating a corner point to keep it all nicely lined up
(by the way, i also checked that the pieces of acrylic were square too )

Bearing in mind that the 5.25" bays are empty (and the drive bay covers are recessed and flat!!) as well as there being holes and a FDD bay opening I opted to tape a thin pad of paper to the bezel too so that the plexi would have a relatively uniform surface to bend over:

The gap at the bottom of the bezel is for USB/firewire ports and possibly a fan controller, power switch (depending if I relocate it from it's current position) and/or a switch to control panel lighting
To bend the fascia, I opted to use...the oven!
I preheated it to 115 degrees(ish) C, got a tray with some teflon baking paper (don't want it to stick )

In for about 10 minutes
Quickly ine it up - gloves were a good idea at this point:

And press it down:

(I actually also used a couple of bottles of Fluid XP to press into the tightly curved portion as they matched the radius )
I waited for the acrylic to cool down for a while, then got impatient and ran it under the cold faucet (well it was there!!)
It came out alright:

well, mostly alright:

I'll be asking around to see if anyone I know has a heatgun now
Not being able to wait, I took the dremel to the acrylic anyways to cut drive bays out:

The cut out went alright but I chipped the cut out piece! I was left with being able to only make one stealth drive bay cover out of the leftover piece

PLASTIC OFFCUT TO THE RESCUE!!!
I had a strip of 3mm left over from my last case window - so I bent it to shape as before and cut out another one:

I ran out of time so I'll finish off the edges, get them nice and sand them smooth a little later

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cool project, cant wait to see what you have planed

I thought I'd have a look at the chassis and sort out the intake - 120mm LED fan will be the go here

I measured/scribed a centre line and where I wanted everything placed - leaving room for the USB/IEEE port cutout at the bottom

Printed out the fan template sheet and taped it down (thanks Johnny English/Glitterkill )

The only problem that I ran into is that the mounting hole for the fan will be over one of the 80mm fan mounts which is recessed into the case I will probably fix it up later with a piece of sheetmetal riveted in place

but for now, I'm going to plod on with cutting a hole (I have plenty of dremel wheels anyway ) 'cause cutting is FUN!!



The fan fits nicely too - I think I'll have to get some sheetmetal though - Don't want it untidy - a rough job is NOT cool, even if it's hidden from view
EDIT: You know, I'll probably end up eating those words......

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I'd decided to go with WrathOfSocrus' idea (thanks dude!) of mounting a blowhole fan to the top of the chassis to allow the cover to be removed/installed easily. Also, I wanted to do my best to tidy up the 120mm intake hole too
I went and had a good look around for some sheetmetal - I ended up with a couple of pieces of aluminium:

I measured out the case for where I wanted the top blowhole to be and realized that there were some bumps on the Chassis that'd get in my way - Dremel (well, cheap, sketchy rotary tool) to the rescue!
Afterwards, I had a test fit:

The Aluminium was JUST thin enough so that the case cover fit nicely without bulging or having to force it to fit (it only sat up about .05mm above the bumps)
On my travels for more cutting discs and a new mandrel for the above mentioned rotary tool (can you say SNAP! ), I picked up a CHEAP 92mm holesaw $5!! (USD 2.50ish)
While dremelling's fun, a holesaw's DEFINITELY faster and cleaner (well cleaner than I can do with a cutting wheel!)

I drilled and countersunk fan mounting holes and test fit it to the chassis again, taping it in place to mark mounting holes - I'm going to go with countersunk screws and nuts as opposed to rivets to attach it (so it can be removed to install stuff if required)

While I'm out here, I might as well cut out the metal around the intake hole too
Time to turn this:

Into this:

I also cut out a section where the USB and IEEE ports will poke through and attach to the bezel:
(it'll be tidied up a little later )
I took the other piece of aluminium, trimmed it to 10mm larger than the hole with some aviation shears and got gnarly on it with the dremel and drill

Finally a quick test fit and marking out holes for the rivets before it gets too dark:

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NICE! For a case that takes up less than a cubic foot, you are going to have some serious CFM action going on with those fans. Aluminum is great to work with too. Just wish I could afford more of it . . .

I like how you completely abandoned any possibility of messing up your case by using the aluminum. It's always good to be safe .

Quote: Originally Posted by WrathOfSocrus NICE! For a case that takes up less than a cubic foot, you are going to have some serious CFM action going on with those fans. Aluminum is great to work with too. Just wish I could afford more of it . . .

I figured that a large intake fan would be the best - As this case was made when pentium 2's were worthy of oogling, I kinda figured that it probably didn't really meet the thermal requirements for an LGA775 chip with a decent video card - It'll run that little bit quieter than 80 or 92mm ones too (especially when I make my fan controller for it ) - there will also be room for a 120mm rad in the case too so watercooling it will be easy as well

the blowhole fan will be controllable and provide decent additional ventillation too - all i need now is to make a decent surround for it - was thinking something akin to MNPCTech's shiny blowhole kit - The problem is that, while I'm keen to support modders, shipping to New Zealand is almost more than the products themselves!! Rather pricy. I'll have a look around at some other options though

I'm rather fortunate that aluminium is reasonably cheap over here - the tradeoff is that PC hardware isn't so well priced.... wanna trade??

EDIT: Cheers Albedo!
I reckon that I'll still be able to kook it though At least it'll give me some more experience (learning from my mistakes and all!)

I hear ya... i've destroyed many things with careless mistakes.

Well I haven't gone crazy with making my mods look nice (yet), but all I can say is the hardwarestore is your friend. I spend countless hours sitting in local places just looking at stuff I can mod to my case. The auto parts store is killer too. I'm certain you can buy and mod something to suit your needs for less than shipping from distant places. Best of all: braggin' rights 'cuz YOU built it!

Here's some more pics of the top blowhole with a fan installed for fit:

one thing that I'm worried about is that the fan may get in the way when installing an optical drive in the top bay (you can see the edge of the bay in the lower LHS) I haven't tried fitting a drive yet - My preliminary measurements are looking like there will be about 5mm free on the smallest drive that I can find - it's gonna be tight!!

I reckon I'll have to choose a drive based on dimensions - or move the blowhole toward the back more (which I REALLY don't want to do as the blowhole will be situated nicely in the middle of the case panel )
The front panel's been riveted on and a fan mounted to test it out also:

I'm having issues trying to find U-trim moulding to finish the hole off though there's only one place over here that lists it for sale - and they aren't responding to my emails hope they get back to me soon

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Quote: Originally Posted by Masterp Here's some more pics of the top blowhole with a fan installed for fit: one thing that I'm worried about is that the fan may get in the way when installing an optical drive in the top bay (you can see the edge of the bay in the lower LHS) I haven't tried fitting a drive yet - My preliminary measurements are looking like there will be about 5mm free on the smallest drive that I can find - it's gonna be tight!! I reckon I'll have to choose a drive based on dimensions - or move the blowhole toward the back more (which I REALLY don't want to do as the blowhole will be situated nicely in the middle of the case panel ) The front panel's been riveted on and a fan mounted to test it out also: I'm having issues trying to find U-trim moulding to finish the hole off though there's only one place over here that lists it for sale - and they aren't responding to my emails hope they get back to me soon

use coaxial cable for u-trim molding, linky

looking good so far

Wow.. that looks better than u-trim .