Archaic: Old School Case Mod Project

C

CMadki4

Supreme [H]ardness
Joined
Feb 3, 2011
Messages
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STATUS: COMPLETE
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So, it's about time for another old school case mod for no reason at all. The best reason of all ;) My last mod/creation was from scratch using lasers, CNC and powder coating. It turned out great, but I want to return yet again to the handcrafted roots of case modding, like I did with my "Snapple" Gateway case mod.

And here is my starting point. A VERY old (by may standards) data acquisition workstation used on a CNC spindle test stand:
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You may ask "what in the world are you going to do with that?" Well... your guess is as good as mine. We'll find out ;)
 
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looking forward to seeing what you going to do with this!

the other one looks amazing
 
Like I said, 'old school', so no CAD here ;) Here's my sketch of what I'm thinking for this mod. I've got a graveyard of old cases that I'm going to cannibalize for this little project.

I'm going to use the existing front panel and replace most of it with a 2.3mm steel mesh. The audio/USB panel will be pulled from an Antec 300. The power buttons/LEDs will be pulled from a Cooler Master Elite 360.

The rear panel has to be completely replaced to match the mATX form factor, as does the motherboard tray. I'll salvage that from an old Gateway case.

Everything will be finished in a textured black.

What do you think?
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Hmm if it does work ill buy it off you, My grandfather wants one.

He found a unopened package of floppy's and wants to put.... Idk what fits on a floppy anymore. Like a picture, Or word document possibly.
 
Dude, just leave the innard alone. Case modded 486 with Mathcoprocessor! I mean ,that thing would run doom like a monster AND look good doin it! :D
 
@mannyman - i've got no way of testing it (that I know of). For the cost of shipping it's yours ;)

@Jorona - is that what those innards are? I know they're like nothing I've ever seen before. :)

The hacking and slicing has begun. Once the angle grinder tastes hot steel and starts shooting spark, she's hard to stop.

So far, I've got the rear panel cutout and have swapped in the rear panel off the old Gateway case. A nice fit. I'll rivet this in place for now and then weld it into place once everything is fitted together:
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I also have the front panel somewhat done. I spliced in the fan grille/holder from the Antec 300, which places the fan sort of mid-way through the front panel, giving me plenty of clearance inside and out. I also cut the 3 bay drive bracket down to 1 bay. And underneath that I've started making the hard drive cage.
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Coming along quicker than I thought. I might even transplant my sig rig into this if it turns out well enough. It would fit nicely in my desk cabinet, above the printer. :D

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Actually lookin at that board again, I'm pretty sure its an Intel i386 witha Cyrix Math Co-processor.

Also damn fine bit of work so far, comin together quick!
 
Very cool! It's rare to see many vintage case mods, but I think they are just as neat.

Makes me want to tear open my old Amiga 2000, if it wreren't for the nostalgia factor..plus it still runs in perfect condition :cool:
 
toddfx said:
Very cool! It's rare to see many vintage case mods, but I think they are just as neat.

Makes me want to tear open my old Amiga 2000, if it wreren't for the nostalgia factor..plus it still runs in perfect condition :cool:
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Thanks bud!
A working Amiga? Sweeeet :)
 
Now this is my kind of case mod :D Should be wicked...

BTW you want anything with the old hardware? Consider putting it up in FS/FT if not; I want to put together a 386 retro build and have been having a hell of a time finding anything locally or on ebay for a decent price.
 
bonnev659 said:
wow it is coming together pretty nicely
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Thank you kindly!

In case anyone is slightly curious, this is what was pulled from the old workstation's corpse. Looks like Jorona is absolutely correct, an i386. I had to google it to know anything about it to be honest ;) Cool looking stuff. And look at all that RAM? What is that, like 256MB!?!? Woooeee! :D

CLICK PIC TO ZOOM:
 
Thats is WAY less then 256mb man. I'd bet those are 1 or 2 mb EDO sticks, giving you 8 to 16 mb of ram. I'm not even sure that it would run doom that well now. Maybe Wolfenstein 3D.

Thats some funny stuff, makes me want to get my 386 Tandy/25 goin. Gotta find a HDD for it though... Anyone have a 500 meg or less HDD lying around that still works?
 
It wouldn't surprise me in the least to find that memory is 256KB RAM chips, and that is 4MB of RAM. 4MB of RAM was a big deal when I had my 386DX20. It wasn't till I got my 486DX4-100 that 8MB started to become affordable.
 
ianshot said:
It wouldn't surprise me in the least to find that memory is 256KB RAM chips, and that is 4MB of RAM. 4MB of RAM was a big deal when I had my 386DX20. It wasn't till I got my 486DX4-100 that 8MB started to become affordable.
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That would end up being 2mb, but I agree, it definately could be as little as 2mb. My gut says 8 though.
 
I've made some headway on this case mod. Today I wanted to redo my hard drive cage and cut the hole for the 140mm exhaust fan on the top of the case.

Here I have the hole cut and the grille piece cut out of the Antec 300:
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The grille inserted, which will be spot welded into place:
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I also began to cut away the front panel. I did my big-n-nasty cuts and will go back and clean it up later:
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But what I'm most pleased with is my hard drive cage. Taking a page out of Lian Li's book, I went with a floating mount method using rubber grommets and thumbscrews. I welded up some perforated sheets to allow a little airflow between the drives. The top sheet is solid, which is where the SSD will be mounted via Velcro or 3M mounting tape:
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And there you have it. That's all for now folks. Let me know what you think! :D
 
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Sold the the i386 and related goodies! That'll help offset any cost of construction (which should be close to nothing since I have everything already in my pile-o-junk).

Tonight, I'm going to try to modify the cover. As of right now you have to slide it on from the front. This won't be possible once the 140mm fan is mounted to the top cover. I'm going to modify it so that it just slides straight down. Nice and easy, then secured with some thumbscrews. :)
 
How much did you get for the guts? I have similar machines and I'm thinking about either parting them out, or re-purposing them somehow.
 
Looking good man, I love the hard drive cage!

Lord Kanti said:
How much did you get for the guts? I have similar machines and I'm thinking about either parting them out, or re-purposing them somehow.
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I bought them for $30 :) Building a retro DOS/Win 3.1 rig with them. Gonna be sweet :cool:
 
lololol, nice buy Capn. We'll have to run some system marks and see if my old IBM P60 luggable PC is as fast! :D
 
$30 isn't bad, for either party :) I'll just pretend that stack of PCs in my garage is a stack of $20 dollar bills :p

Man, I can't wait to see more of this build >.<
 
Thanks everyone for the comments!

I got a little more done. I tacked everything together best I could and laid down the first couple coats of paint. It's coming together well enough. I just need to tweak a few things, a few more coats of paint and work on the front panel.
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Thank you thank you!

I'm actually looking forward to putting this to use. Right now I've got an Antec 300 on it's side. This will fit really nicely in my desk and look slick holding all my hardware. :)

If the weather is bad this weekend, I may just retreat to the shop and knock out the front panel and all the remaining little details.
 
Update: I got a chance to mess around on the front panel and actually got it most of the way completed. I cut the perforated sheet and bend the appropriate angle to get it to fit the existing contours. Once fitted, I epoxied it in place and weighted it down with a couple small kettlebells.
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I also fit the USB/Audi I/O panel in. I had to switch from using the Antec 300 to the one pulled from the CM Elite 360 for clearance reasons. I therefore had to make a little custom spacer/mounting bracket for it. I used an old 3.5" black bay cover from the Elite 360 and epoxied it into place:
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Only things left to do to the front panel are the buttons and LEDs, the slot for the optical drive and paint!
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Also worth noting: CapnCrunch53 actually got the original i386 hardware from this case up and running! Nice :) Skills....
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If I had a case in this configuration, I'd set a monitor on top of it even though I know you're not supposed to; and I'm not talking LCD :p What is the best way to reinforce a layout like this so that one can safely use it as a monitor stand? Is monitor weight even an issue with LCD now? I'd hate to actually break something because of my disregard for warning labels, but if I were in the position of modding a case such as this one, what would be the steps to take in order to build a PC "roll-cage?"
 
Lord Kanti said:
If I had a case in this configuration, I'd set a monitor on top of it even though I know you're not supposed to; and I'm not talking LCD :p What is the best way to reinforce a layout like this so that one can safely use it as a monitor stand? Is monitor weight even an issue with LCD now? I'd hate to actually break something because of my disregard for warning labels, but if I were in the position of modding a case such as this one, what would be the steps to take in order to build a PC "roll-cage?"
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Short answer?
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:D If I were to load up this case with a monitor, I would add ribs to the underside of the cover, running from front to back. And if it was a CRT, then I'd also add a little more thickness to the front and rear panels.

I wouldn't mind putting an LCD on this, it could support it no problem. But my desk probably isn't deep enough for this and my keyboard and mouse (I refuse to use those little slide-out keyboard drawers ;) ).

But that's what I would do if I were to set a monitor on top of this case mod.
 
I had a few moments this evening so I did a little work on the case mod. Mainly the front panel. First thing I did was fit the power button, reset button and status LEDs from the Cooler Master Elite 360 to the front panel mesh. I did this same thing on my Asimov case, so this was a breeze:
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Next, for optical drive access, I'm going to try to expose only the tray and not the entire drive. This makes for a slick look, if you ask me. I put masking tap over the drive tray cover to protect and make it more visible so I could see it through the mesh and mark my cutting lines. I still need to open up the slot more, but you get the idea. I believe what I'll do is cut a piece of the mesh to cover the drive tray and make it match the front panel. Maybe, we'll see. Sort of flying by the seat of my pants here. :)
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Another thing, I almost forgot to mention: I've changed how the front panel mounts. It used to fasten to the case by screws from the back side. But to make things easier and quicker, I took the little snap-on clips from the CM Elite 360 and retrofitted them to my front panel. Now it just clips on and off with ease. Much better! (no pics of that, sorry :( )
 
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