Project: OSIDIAS (SFF taken to the extreme)

[C-J]

Amazing Work Man. this Case is looking like a Million Bucks so far, Cant wait for final pics.

[craigbru]

Cant wait dude, cant wait

Lol. I hope you're a patient guy. We're talking months before completion yet.

Amazing Work Man. this Case is looking like a Million Bucks so far, Cant wait for final pics.

Thanks man! It's not even to what I would call a 'pretty' stage yet.

[yngndrw]

For your dust extractor, you could try mounting it to your Dremel - If you made a clear plastic dust hood to go around the cutting disk you could connect more dust and still see where you're cutting. Additionally you can cut anywhere without having to move the cut under the vacuum hose.

The shape would be like this blade guard:

[bladechai]

Lol. I hope you're a patient guy. We're talking months before completion yet.


No problem, I can wait....

[craigbru]

For your dust extractor, you could try mounting it to your Dremel - If you made a clear plastic dust hood to go around the cutting disk you could connect more dust and still see where you're cutting. Additionally you can cut anywhere without having to move the cut under the vacuum hose.

The shape would be like this blade guard:

While that may work, I'm guessing that it might make the Dremel a little hard to control. That's something I'm pretty sensitive about. I've got to have absolute control.

Lol. I hope you're a patient guy. We're talking months before completion yet.


No problem, I can wait....

That's a good thing, lol. There are some things yet to come that are going to take some thinking to implement. I'm currently working on making an aluminum mold for the interior tray. It's going to be solid CF, and the mold is a puzzler...

[craigbru]

Update time! Today we pick up with the start of the interior assembly. Since I'm a glutton for punishment, I've decided to make the entire thing out of a single piece of molded carbon fiber. Since the dimensions have to be perfect, I am going to be using a two part mold. An inner and outer layer, with the CF sandwiched in between. In order to pull this off, I've got to do some very careful measurements, and even better cutting.

I'll be using 1.5mm aluminum for the molds. Here you can see a 4' piece marked down the center. I should be able to get both an inner and outer mold out of this 2'x4' sheet.



Next up I've got to mark out all my cut and bend lines. There is no room for error here. Everything is down to the millimeter.



After the rough cuts were made...



After spending a maddening long time with the aluminum in my metal brake, I was left with the following. Mind you this was a little tricky, since it didn't exactly fit in there very well after the first few bends...





Now it was time to stick it inside the case for a test fit. I had no doubt everything would line up, but it's always a good idea to double check.





Next up is the outer mold. Once that is completed, I'll rub down the aluminum with release wax, and play with a little more carbon fiber. Woohoo!

Also, as of this morning, I've learned that OSIDIAS was nominated for bit-tech mod of the month! I'm honored!

http://www.bit-tech.net/modding/mod-...th-july-2010/1

[OC Maximus]

Congrats on your nomination!! Its always nice to be noticed.

Thanks for the update. This build has been one of my favorites by far.

[yngndrw]

If you don't win then whoever decided needs their eyes checking.

[UrbanSmooth]

Sub'd for epic SFF.

[Johnny87au]

looking good, hope to see updated sooner "hint hint"

[craigbru]

Congrats on your nomination!! Its always nice to be noticed.

Thanks for the update. This build has been one of my favorites by far.

Thank you! It definitely does feel good. There's always some great competition as well.

If you don't win then whoever decided needs their eyes checking.

Lol, I'm doing pretty good in the polls so far. Funny thing is, when I saw I was nominated, I was a little surprised. I didn't think I had nearly enough work done to justify it.

Sub'd for epic SFF.

Thanks man!

looking good, hope to see updated sooner "hint hint"

Thanks bro! I probably won't have an update until later this week. I've got to get some work done on another project with a new deadline.

[Soul_train]

Keep it coming bro
looks amazing and great work you have done in that cut's

[OC Maximus]

Honestly, has to be one of the top 10 builds of 2010. Keep it coming Craig, keep it coming.

[craigbru]

Keep it coming bro
looks amazing and great work you have done in that cut's

Thanks! I always appreciate the compliments from you Soul.

Honestly, has to be one of the top 10 builds of 2010. Keep it coming Craig, keep it coming.

Thanks bro! I aim to please!

[craigbru]

Although Project Hutch has been getting most of my time lately, I was able to get a little work done on OSIDIAS while waiting for some JB Weld to dry... I picked up on the continuation of the molds for the interior assembly. When I last updated, I had the inner mold completed. Now it was a matter of laying out and cutting the exterior. What you see here is another 1'x4' piece of aluminum sheet.



After cutting...



Time to get this thing bent!











Now, to get one of the inside bends done, I had to switch to my 18" brake.



With all of the bends done, it was time to see how they fit together. I slipped the outer mold over the inner, and all was well! I've got about 2mm between them. That should allow for about 6 layers of carbon fiber.



Since I knew the molds were going to work, it was time to reinforce the inner mold against flexing. All I needed was a piece of 2x4 cut down to 8cm in width. The board was aligned and epoxied in place. Final measurements indicate that I got the perfect alignment I was hoping for. The back is perfectly parallel top and bottom, and I won't need to make adjustments of any kind.



Up next I've got to add a few pieces of angled aluminum for mounting tabs, and I'm ready to wax and lay down the fiber!

[phinix_mike]

Nice bends Craig!
How many brakes do you have?! Is that 18" useful or do you use big one more often?

[craigbru]

Nice bends Craig!
How many brakes do you have?! Is that 18" useful or do you use big one more often?

Thanks Mike! I've got two brakes. A 40" and the 18". The big one is much easier to use, but I have clearance issues on some parts. The smaller will fit almost anything, but it sometimes flexes and lacks enough leverage for thicker materials.

[Johnny87au]

looking good pal, havent been back in a while lucky u havent updated it to much hehe!

[craigbru]

looking good pal, havent been back in a while lucky u havent updated it to much hehe!

Thanks bro! I'll have a hopefully epic update soon. I think I'm mostly prepped for tomorrow. I just have to cut the layers of CF down to size in the morning. I've been running the process through my head. I've got less than 30 minutes to wrap 6 layers around and get the outer mold in place. Realistically I'd like to get it done in 20. That would leave me with time to spare in case adjustments are needed. If the outer layer weren't cosmetic, it wouldn't be so bad, but it has to be perfect. Lol, I'm stressing a little. I do have the molds all waxed and ready to go. I've also waxed and layered a small patch of fiber down on a test piece of aluminum tonight. I want to be sure it releases correctly. If not, that would be messy...

[nn_step]

you could save much more space if you use a picoPSU

[craigbru]

you could save much more space if you use a picoPSU

I'd save tons of space... but there wouldn't be nearly enough power. The mains system is high end, and the case is packed with other goodies requiring lots of power.

[Sn0wm@n]

your tower looks like this ... to this i say good job

[miahallen]

Excellent work so far....I'm loving this build

I'd save tons of space... but there wouldn't be nearly enough power. The mains system is high end, and the case is packed with other goodies requiring lots of power.

Speaking of which, I haven't seen a parts list....what HW are you going to use?

[craigbru]

your tower looks like this ... to this i say good job

Nice! I hadn't seen that before, but now that you put that pic up, I can definitely see the similarities. Part of my original inspiration came from a RED camera cage I saw quite some time ago.

Excellent work so far....I'm loving this build



Speaking of which, I haven't seen a parts list....what HW are you going to use?

Thanks! I'm going to use my existing hardware for the moment. Granted, by the time this thing is running, I'll be looking to upgrade again. Right now I've got a Silverstone Decathlon 1000 watt PSU, Asus Rampage II GENE, i7 920, OCZ ram, a pair of Saphire Vapor-X 5870's, OCZ SSD's, and a slot load Blu-ray drive. I've also got MIPS, and Heatkiller 3.0 blocks for the board. Then I've got the side LCD screens, the Viliv, two radiators, pump, the Aqua Computer Aquaero, multiswitch, and flow meter, LED strip lighting, Silverstone hot swap SATA connectors, the Via pico-itx (with it's own SSD), Asus wireless access point, 5 port ethernet hub, Bitspower compression fittings, and a Koolance reservoir... That covers most of what I can remember. Lol.

[craigbru]

Update time! I actually livestreamed the fiber going down, although it was a huge pain. For some reason I thought it was a good idea to skip taping the edges of the fiber. Needless to say those stray fibers soon became a problem as the layers went down. I managed to keep them out of the way, and got 5 layers on before I ran out of resin. That means I'm a layer short of what I wanted to be. Although looking at the finished assembly, it's likely thick enough, but I'm going to give it one more anyway. I had a little trouble sliding the outer mold in place. The resin kept sticking to the mold and pulling it down with it. Doh, why didn't I wrap plastic around it before the mold?! That would have taken care of the problem, and I'd be done. As it is, now I've got to sand and add the last layer anyway. Mostly for cosmetic reasons mind you. The outer mold caused some wavy weaves because of the sticky resin... and I just can't have that. I'm out of resin though, and will have to order more before continuing.

Well, enough of that. On to the pics! Here I'm using a template to cut out the layers of CF.



Obviously I couldn't take pics while wrapping, but here is the mold all clamped up.



Now it was time to see if that mold wax release was going to do it's job. I had a total of 3 layers on, so I was pretty confident. Success! The outer mold released without an issue. Here you can see the interior assembly in it's freshly released state. There are a few spots that didn't get completely 'covered' with resin, but it's hardly an issue. There was complete saturation and it's damn solid!



Finally, I took the dremel and cut off most of the excess fiber. You can see the interior mold is still in place. There's a good reason for that. It is cut to the exact dimensions that the assembly needs to be. During the final cut down, I'll use the interior mold as a guide to make sure everything is cut correctly. Without it, I don't think measuring out where I needed to cut would have been so fun...





At this point I've got to get some more resin ordered. In the meantime I'll sand down and prep the interior for the last layer of CF. Then I can start making holes in it for all the components and wiring. Woohoo!