Trinity

[Edd]

ARGH. An accidental shift + scroll just took me back a page or two and erased everything I'd written! :(

Take Two.

Before I begin, a note just to say that all the machines in this house have network names taken from the Matrix (Neo, Trinity and Morpheus are the two machines and the server, Seraph is my iPaq and Apoc is my T610 (bluetooth connection) :p

Anyway, our family machine is a pretty basic system, 1Ghz Duron with 256MB of RAM and an old ATi Rage graphics card. But it does everything required of it without making a fuss, so it's enough.
It currently resides in the very first case I bought with my first PC build, back when I thought full tower cases were rare and exotic. Now I've got my PC70, I've realised that they're not that cool (unless its an ALU one ;)), but whatever the material they are a pain in the arse to move around!

The family PC inherited this old case when it was built (as I had a new Lian Li PC7), but as you'll see from the following image, it's not exactly the prettiest of things and doesn't fit in very well with its surroundings!

http://gallery.liquidelephant.co.uk/albums/trinity/Trinity_Original.jpg

(Not to mention it's hopelessly impractical for the system that's in it)
So as a little summer project, I decided to revive my old PC7. It should look far better in that room, and will be much more practical. However, I had my first modding attempts on it a while back, and it's feeling a bit under the weather now.
Here are some images of what I did to it.

http://gallery.liquidelephant.co.uk/albums/trinity/IM000437.jpg
The original design for this was a really cool mix of circles following in to the centre. However when it came to be done, we realised that you wouldn't be able to see the insides. So we enlarged the centre circle ... and it ended up looking a bit like Mickey Mouse :o

http://gallery.liquidelephant.co.uk/albums/trinity/IM000439.jpg
I did the drive cages black. I thought it looked pretty damn good if I say so myself. Unfortunately we bought a cheap rivet gun and cocked up a few things when we rivetted it back together. Also the paint job wasn't particularly fantastic, so a lot of it ended up chipping off.
Oh yeah, I'm also STILL trying to get that flowery bed replaced :P

http://gallery.liquidelephant.co.uk/albums/trinity/IM000442.jpg
Closeup of the newly painted parts.

http://gallery.liquidelephant.co.uk/albums/trinity/IM000443.jpg
I also did the PSU mount and the inner fan guard (moving it to the outside after dremelling out the existing guard).

So, everything had to be taken apart and readied for priming.
I don't have any images of pre-primed bits apart from the main chassis (and the main drive cage ... actually I'm not sure where that's disappeared to!!

You can click these images for supar-xobx-hueg-lol style images ;)

http://gallery.liquidelephant.co.uk/albums/trinity/Trinity_Mod_002.sized.jpg (http://gallery.liquidelephant.co.uk/albums/trinity/Trinity_Mod_002.jpg)

http://gallery.liquidelephant.co.uk/albums/trinity/Trinity_Mod_003.sized.jpg (http://gallery.liquidelephant.co.uk/albums/trinity/Trinity_Mod_003.jpg)

http://gallery.liquidelephant.co.uk/albums/trinity/Trinity_Mod_004.sized.jpg (http://gallery.liquidelephant.co.uk/albums/trinity/Trinity_Mod_004.jpg)
I can't do anything with the chassis yet because I need a 92mm fan to measure up a placement on the back, then cut it out. Likewise on the front for a 120mm (I have a fan, but I'm not sure where it's going to go yet)

http://gallery.liquidelephant.co.uk/albums/trinity/Trinity_Mod_005.sized.jpg (http://gallery.liquidelephant.co.uk/albums/trinity/Trinity_Mod_005.jpg)
Here's a dartboard, for no particular reason

http://gallery.liquidelephant.co.uk/albums/trinity/Trinity_Mod_006.sized.jpg (http://gallery.liquidelephant.co.uk/albums/trinity/Trinity_Mod_006.jpg)
This is the front panel with everything removed.

I'm going to cut most of this away and replace with a plexi front.

Oh yes, see who can get which component in these images isn't actually for this case ...

[Edd]

GG me being a retard.

I found the main drive cage and thought "oooh I'll put some primer on it now". As I did the outside I realised that I need to sort out some mounting holes for the DVD I'll be putting in before I spray it :rant:

[furious trout]

Oh yes, see who can get which component in these images isn't actually for this case ...
Is it the dartboard?^_^
I like the placement next to the door, better make sure your aim is good! :h34r:

[Starbuck3733T]

Im glad someone has the balls to paint an aluminum case.

In college, my dartboard was ON the DOOR to one of my 'mates bedrooms.

We never played when he was in the room.

[Edd]

Is it the dartboard? Whoops, apart from the dartboard! :D
It's actually next to a wardrobe with a mirror on it (very handy storage in the garage)

As for having the balls to paint the case ... well, having the brainlessness migh be a better way of putting it ;)
I've put down the first coat of colour on three of the smallest components and that seems to have taken well. However I started painting the motherboard tray ... when I painted onto the rear IO area, the paint started to "crack" (except it can't crack because it's liquid ... but you see what I'm trying to convey here :p). Further investigation showed that the primer itself hadn't even taken to the metal properly :confused:

Not entirely sure what's up with that, as everything else is fine and it's all the same material.
I'm going to leave everything to dry overnight and see how bad it is in the morning before I decide how to approach it.

[Starbuck3733T]

What did you bathe it in prior to paint? What kind of primer? I'd imagine etching primer is what you want.

[Edd]

Just plain ol' metal primer ...

[Edd]

Gimme an A! (A!)
Gimme an R! (R!)
Gimme a G! (G!)
Gimme an H! (H!)

What does it spell?

ARGH!

More paint problems :( I left the first coat of black to dry overnight (over 2 nights in fact) then went in today and sprayed the otherside, and also did the first coat on the drive cages. Disaster. Something has gone wrong either with the primer or with the black paint I'm using. The following pictures show just how fudged up it's gotten.

Click for larger
http://gallery.liquidelephant.co.uk/albums/trinity/Trinity_Mod_007.sized.jpg (http://gallery.liquidelephant.co.uk/albums/trinity/Trinity_Mod_007.jpg)

http://gallery.liquidelephant.co.uk/albums/trinity/Trinity_Mod_008.sized.jpg (http://gallery.liquidelephant.co.uk/albums/trinity/Trinity_Mod_008.jpg)

http://gallery.liquidelephant.co.uk/albums/trinity/Trinity_Mod_009.sized.jpg (http://gallery.liquidelephant.co.uk/albums/trinity/Trinity_Mod_009.jpg)

[fillip]

UH-OH! :blink:




what's happened there then? Has the paint not adhered to the primer or has it reacted with the primer in some weird way?

[Edd]

I have no idea! :( :confused:

As you can see it's patchy (on some bits), which doesn't make much sense to me. There didn't seem to be anything wrong with the primer application, and the first side of the aquatube mount and PSU mount was fine (with the black paint).
Really have no idea :(. The paints/primer are from the same company (Plasti-Kote) so one would assume they'd work well together. I didn't buy the plain black colour (that I used in the first set of pics) because there was only one can left, and it was more expensive, so when I saw the metallic stuff I thought maybe that would give me a better result anyway.

Perhaps I should strip it all and start over with the plain black :mellow:

[Knipex]

You got silicones some where...
In the shed you are spraying in do you store solvents, cleaners ?

has someone been cleaning carpets, or the car ?? Any car polish ?? Son of a gun or other vinal cleaners...

Most of these contain silicones and will react to paint and stop it sticking...

Only solution is either sand it back to bare metal or visit a body shop and get a some sealer / blocker primer. You will still need to sand it smooth and wipe it all down with thinners before applying the blocker. Be warned though it aint cheap and its pretty toxic so if you can get them to apply it.

Before you paint anything wash it down with thinners and find somewhere else to paint.....

I actually used son of a gun to purposely get this affect on the new case bezel I am painting.. Just a quick spray and wipe then paint. Its looks fugly but can generate the effect I am looking for....

[Edd]

Right, this mod is being put on a permanent hold. I sanded back some of the components to bare metal and did a test spray with the type of paint I used originally (the very first time I sprayed the case) and it's still going weird. I also tested spraying over some of the paint that had gone weird, and the new layer just reacted with whatever nasty stuff is underneath.

There's nowhere else to paint unfortunately (that was in the garage, and that's all we have), and something seems to have gone badly wrong either with the metal or the environment so I'm not going to waste anymore money on it (but most importantly, I'm getting grief from the folks because it means there's half a computer scattered around my room, and my dad can't put his car away at night because there's a table full of stuff on his side of the garage!)

I was intending to use some of the chassis to chop up and use as spare ALU for my case if I wanted to do anything, but seeing as something unknown has happened to all the bits it's probably best I leave it (and can't face hacking up my £150 tower, what with my shaky mod track record!)

[Starbuck3733T]

Get another can of the same paint - you may have a bad batch.

[fillip]

I was gonna suggest the same as star, also, did you actually clean down the case after re-sanding using something like sugar soap?

[Starbuck3733T]

Well, there's always a dip in soapy water, then alcohol, then wipe down with cheesecloth. That's usually the prep steps I take.

[fillip]

Well, there's always a dip in soapy water, then alcohol, then wipe down with cheesecloth. That's usually the prep steps I take.
ditto, though i usually skip the alcohol step.

[Edd]

OK, one last shot :p
I think that last post was more exasperation more than anything else (why can nothing be simple?! :()

I think I'm driven to try again by the prospect of a black aquatube faceplate than anything else, though I've got a new one on order just in case I have royally messed up the existing one.

[fillip]

Persevere!! u'll get there eventually. Try some self-etching primer as Star suggested, I've seen it suggested that using the kind of primer you did initially (the Plasticote one) then it needs an additional priming code to adhere to. This is where the self etching primer is used on the bare aluminium.

[Starbuck3733T]

ditto, though i usually skip the alcohol step.
Depending on the type of soap used, it may leave residue. In my opinion, dish soaps with smelly stuff in them tend to leave a film. The alcohol makes sure that residue is gone.

I'm paranoid :)

[fillip]

Depending on the type of soap used, it may leave residue. In my opinion, dish soaps with smelly stuff in them tend to leave a film. The alcohol makes sure that residue is gone.

I'm paranoid :)
sugar soap doesn't leave residue if u wipe the walls down with plain water afterwards. If u didn't already know it's just for cleaning down walls + ceilings before decorating. So should be fine for our kind of uses, as u says, if it's rinsed down well after.

[Starbuck3733T]

Hmm. I wonder what they call that stuff in the US...

[Edd]

I'm sure we've got some sugar soap somewhere. My dad's in Germany (should have asked him to stop by AquaComputer :D) until Thursday so I might not make any progress until the end of the week (garage is like an aladdins cave (albeit a well-ordered one) so it should be fun trying to find it!)

[fillip]

UK suppliers:

http://www.decoratingdirect.co.uk/viewprod/b/BEESS/
http://www.birdbrand.co.uk/sugar.htm
http://www.screwfix.com/app/sfd/cat/pro.jsp?ts=89082&id=17736
http://www.hardware-ironmongers.com/results.cfm?ct_ref=3480

Also found results for New Zealand and Oz but nowhere in the States... weird.

[Knipex]

If it was me I would sand it all down again, get some thinners to wash to with (cheap and east to get) and paint outdoors.. Leave it outside as long as you can before bringing it inside.
Star could be right though, perhaps you just got some bad paint...

[mnpctech]

crud, what a bummer.

If the paint is bad, call PLastikote's tech support and explain what happened. If you followed their directions, youre entitled to be reimbursed for the damage (at least in that states). I had a problem like this 2 years w/ Painters Choice and got a refund check for both the paint and cost of case. I was also very persistant. If anything, youre entitled to some answers.

Just curious, is the primer and paint Laquer or Enamel?

Its also not a bad idea to look up that powdercoater, for as much time as youre gonna invest at this point, you might as well pay them to recoat it IMHO.

[Starbuck3733T]

mnpctech has a very good point: persistence. Tech support lines are there for a reason, and if the warranty/gaurantee says something you should do your damndest to get it.

Bummer bout the sugar soap. I'll just keep on doing what I'm doing... I don't paint too often. (No enclosable area).

Yes... yes... come to the dark side... go to the powdercoater... have durability in your finish... yesssss.. :)

[Pug]

crud, what a bummer.

If the paint is bad, call PLastikote's tech support and explain what happened. If you followed their directions, youre entitled to be reimbursed for the damage (at least in that states). I had a problem like this 2 years w/ Painters Choice and got a refund check for both the paint and cost of case. I was also very persistant. If anything, youre entitled to some answers.

Just curious, is the primer and paint Laquer or Enamel?

Its also not a bad idea to look up that powdercoater, for as much time as youre gonna invest at this point, you might as well pay them to recoat it IMHO.
That is a good point. ^^^
When I did the grille on Hex, I went into Halfords and asked for etch primer - the guy said he didn't have it but that zinc primer would work fine, when it flaked (as I had predicted) I took it back & made them refund me the full price of the original can (which was cool, as it had been part of a 3 for 2 deal and I kept the other two :D ).
If I can find my etch primer again, you can post me the plate (cleaned up first ;) ) and I'll give it a quick coat for you, to save you lashing out £15 a can like I had to.

I'm still waiting for the pics to come in (haven't had the time to sign up for DSL yet) but I'm guessing you had probs spraying the old Lian Li?
Thing is, metal primer won't do much good as it ain't metal you're spraying... it's been hard-anodised. As I understand it, it's more akin to sapphire (Al2O3) which will be less likely to give the necessary key (or microscopic pitting of the metal's surface) for the paint to adhere to.
Can't think what would be the best thing to use off the top of my head though. -_-

[Edd]

Aye, the few bits of Lian Li I sprayed came out horrible. The problem is the paint is being a total PITA in coming off. The top surfaces are fine (just blast the bugger with a heatgun and it comes off OK), but trying to get inside the drive cages ... nightmare.

So far the only thing I need doing is the AquaTube plate, which I've cleaned up and should be OK with.

I'm still contemplating what to do with the rest of the case. I want to make it work, but the idea was to do the painting fairly quickly and cheaply, in order to place the main cash on the plexi faceplate (there's a place in town that does some excellent work with plexi). As it is I've already bought about 6 cans of paint and I'm still at square 1!

[fillip]

I read a post on Bit-tech a while ago about painting a lian-li, as Pug said, the prob is it's been anodised. IIRC the guy sand blasted the anodised surface down to bare metal then started over with etching primer etc etc...

[Edd]

Hmmmm. I have sanded (hand sanded though) everything but some bits less than others ... perhaps that's why I got the patchiness.

[fillip]

Hmmmm. I have sanded (hand sanded though) everything but some bits less than others ... perhaps that's why I got the patchiness.
Need to completely remove the anodised layer (i guess thats why the other guy had his case sandblasted professionaly) so i s'pose you could find somewhere to do it or sand some more - try an electric snder maybe??

[mnpctech]

For alum AMS gtower and Kingwin cases which are anodized, I used a Black & Decker Mouse sander w/ their medium grade sandpaper, then sanded by hand starting w/ 400, then 600 before applying the self etching primer. Worked great

I have sanded (hand sanded though) everything but some bits less than others ... perhaps that's why I got the patchinessSounds like a good assessment to me.

[fillip]

Hit the proverbial nail on the head i reckon.

[Greeny]

I'm not even sure the Lian-Li cases are anodised on the inside, the outer panels have brushed anodised finish which is very tough. The interior case metal seems to pick up scratches too easily to be anodised.

I have attacked mine with abbrassive metal polish in the past a few times to smooth out some of the scratches, I don't think this would be so neccessary were it hard anodised.

:confused:

[Da_Rude_Baboon]

I the drive cages are anodised but the rest is not.

[Edd]

This should probably go in the Neo thread, but hey.

Seeing as the priority @ the mo is to get my PC back up and running in its case with the WC loop rebuilt I'm concentrating on the aquatube faceplate. Today I gave it its first coat of black (lovely sunny day today) and let it dry for an hour, then brought it inside (to let the paint harden firmly and to avoid possible contamination in the garage).

Here's a picture (slightly blurry) of it sitting on top of the aquatube itself.

http://gallery.liquidelephant.co.uk/albums/Computer/Blaquatube.jpg

[Edd]

http://gallery.liquidelephant.co.uk/albums/trinity/Trinity_Mod_010.jpg

R! Avast!

Back on track now.

I started my afternoon by sanding the EVO grill and spraying it black. Unfortunately due to the lighting this picture doesn't really do it justice. I also did one side of the PSU mounting plate, seeing as the grill is for my PC and not this one!
http://gallery.liquidelephant.co.uk/albums/trinity/Trinity_Mod_011.jpg

I then got rid of the top level of "tabs" in the CD-ROM bays. It looks a bit rough in this image I think but they're almost non-existant and smooth in real life.
http://gallery.liquidelephant.co.uk/albums/trinity/Trinity_Mod_013.jpg

I then had my first "real" dremelling experience. I've used it a fair amount for sanding and stuff, but never really cutouts. After using an old CD-ROM drive for very tough test fitting I realised I'd need a cutout in the bottom of the bay in order to route the cables through. Hopefully I've made it big enough.

http://gallery.liquidelephant.co.uk/albums/trinity/Trinity_Mod_012.jpg

Nice action-shot of my dad in that one too :D

I've also sprayed that black now, but the rain was coming down pretty heavy outside and getting cold, so I decided to leave the photos of that for now.

I just took a couple of pics (with and without flash) of the rad grill sitting on top of the case lid just to show you better how it looks. I'm really pleased with it :)

http://gallery.liquidelephant.co.uk/albums/trinity/Trinity_Mod_014.jpg

http://gallery.liquidelephant.co.uk/albums/trinity/Trinity_Mod_015.jpg

[Edd]

Ah, also an enquiry.
Seeing as my last paint job (a year ago, not the bodge up with the dodgy paint) wasn't too durable, I am wondering:

How many coats should I apply to the Aquatube faceplate and Rad grill? I'm not going to be going for mirror finish (because I think it stands out from the brushed ALU in the wrong sort of way IMO) but I do want it to be as scratch-resistant as possible.

This of course also applies to the entire Trinity mod, but those two pieces are the most important (as soon as Pug gets back to me I can (hopefully) start getting my PC back together again, and get rid of this f*&£%(! Thermaltake Volcano!)

[Greeny]

I usually do about 3-5 layers of paint and a further 3-5 layers of lacquer when I'm spraying drives, this seems to be pretty durable but not indestructable by any means.

[Pug]

The key to a good durable finish is in the preparation...
If you can get hold of some etch primer to key the initial surface contact, I think half the battle will be won. If you don't fancy the cost and precaution necessary to do it yourself, pop down to your local sprayshop and ask them to wander past it with the gun next time they do any bare-metal work.
Most will oblige for the sake of a few beer tokens in the back pocket of whoever's doing the spraying. :)

Love the black grille against the silver... first time I've seen it done that I remember. B)
Looking forward to more.

[G-gnome]

Nice looking case top - the grille really looks good against the silver aluminium.

[Edd]

Cheers for the comments so far guys.

This mod's going to be nothing special (/me looks enviously at the RexMods case). I think if I had a Dragon to work with I might be a bit more outgoing, but there's only so much I dare to do with aluminium! Doing this HAS inspired me to do something to my full tower, but ... the risk isn't worth the cost of buying another one ;) so instead I'm just accentuating some of the parts in black. It'll still look pretty much like a standard case, but just a tad different.

Seeing as it looks like I actually will get the Trinity mod finished at some point I'll take a trip down to the plexiglass workshop in town and see what kind of stuff they're doing, perhaps propose my ideas to somebody there and see what they think. I'm really tempted to put a watercooling loop in, just because it would look sweet, but I don't think a 1Ghz Duron with an ageing ATi Rage card warrants that kind of cooling power! :D

[Starbuck3733T]

Oh yes the black and teh silvar are sweeeet!!

[Edd]

Aye, I was floored by the beauty of an old Coolermaster case over on Ars once with the black bays. It was just elegant, simple ... perfect!

I ideally wanted to use the PSone LCD in the floppy bays (looks black when it's off then comes alive!). I've not tried the resistor trick yet (still far too many unfinished bits lying around here) but I have a bad feeling about it, as I cocked up the soldering so badly the first time around (of the VGA cable).

Anywho, off for a visit to the dentist then see if I can procure some of the right grit level sandpaper at long last so I can get on with a new coat of paint for each of the components!