I've finally come up with an Idea for a case. I work on custom cars and trucks so much I have little time to mod.But now I've been promoted to shop foreman so with the $22.50 an hour salary I can afford some more time. I fabricate cars and trucks all the time and have a welder and air compressor at home so it should'nt be to hard. I want to make a snail like case . so the bottom houses the motherboard and it will curl to the top( a total of two feet) where at the end of the curl will be the drives. Has any body seen this done if so I will scrap it cause I want something original. And it will have perfect airflow because of the design.

sounds awesome to me, and I've never seen anything like it before. It'd be cool also if you were to make the end of each segment a little higher than the beginning of the next. In this vertical gap you could weld in a piece of perforated steel. I don't know if the little holes will help with airflow but when you light them up they'd look awesome, especially considering the shape. All of this is assuming that you're just making it the shape of a snail and not trying to make it look like an actual snail. Either way this should be fun, I like watching professionals work. Good luck.

wow you gave me a great great ideas, and I am just going with the shape not the look of a snail.

I've got all sorts of ideas if you want more. I like cases that are round in the way that I imagine yours to be... so when I think of what the final product will look like I get all sorts of ideas, especially considering you work with this type of fabrication all the time.

definitely never heard of anything like that. go for it, but remember the golden rule of crazy mods and fabrications:

we want pictures.

I like the idea but I must agree with the pictures thing.

Wow that's definately an idea. I'm not visualizing it too well, but once you get started I'll definately be interested enough to find out

I'm going to draw something up in paint. I also have a english wheel to make the curves. Don't worry youll get pics, I'm going topick up the steel today.

Sounds cool Just get us some picks or drawings so we can visualize the thing!

Sounds like you know what yoru doing! Looking forward to seeing more!

I was wondering when someone with the tools and skills to build something like that would show up. Sounds like a great idea. Starting with something like a motorcycle fender rounded the right way might be a easy short cut. If you wanted to keep the round shape most of the way around you could lift it up on some kind of legs and stealth the IO panel on the bottom. Cool idea.

thats a great Idea anti. this is why I posted this Idea before I started cause the brotherhood here is giving me great ideas to add!!

I'm gonna go ahead and shoot some more ideas at you because I like this idea a lot.

Mount the Optical Drives at the very bottom of the case up front. Rather than a door or stealthed drives, make the last section of the curve slide up under the one right before it. If you were really cool you'd make it motorized.

On the very outside of the case have a rounded rod that is about 1" or so away from the shell of the case. You could have on on both sides and then towards the top they could move closer together as a handle... after the handle they'd move back to where they were before. Wow... that'd be sick... if you can't visualize any of these ideas in your head I can draw them for you.

If you're going to do an intake fan, I'd do a simple circle and put in some modder's mesh (the hex style mesh... I suppose in your occupation you can probably find this stuff somewhere else for cheap... so not necessarioy modder's mesh) and then paint the mesh the same color as the rest of the case. But, I'd say you shouldn't draw attention to the intake, but rather make other sections of the case with cut-out designs that have the mesh behind them as well. Perhaps you could cut out some sort of tribal or some sort of racing stripe pattern.

Okay, that's all.

totally MSman, I,m getting excityed hearing you talk about it. if you can draw up some ideasOK. I could'nt sleep tonight I'm going to buy the steel today

I like the idea too, but it'll probably look more like an armadillo than a snail...which ain't a bad thing. I picture overlapping plates like the bezel vent on this handcrafted aluminum case:

http://www.eugenesargent.com/case1.htm

The idea about the optical drive cover is good, but you could use a remote (maybe an IR or UF remote control?) opening switch and make it mechanical, simplifying it (in other words, let the drive lift its own cover). The gaps between the plates should be sufficient for venting.

I'll bring some of my drawing stuff with me tomorrow at work and work some pictures of what I envision for you tomorrow. I work from 4-10PM so I'll post the pictures late tomorrow night or Monday Morning. This is an exciting project. (wanna know why? mostly because it is different, you're making it from scratch, and because you said you're already going to buy the metal).