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Hints, Tips and Solutions (Do NOT post requests for help here) If you have any useful general hints and tips for vintage technology repair and restoration, please share them here. PLEASE DO NOT POST REQUESTS FOR HELP HERE!

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Old 12th Dec 2016, 11:10 pm   #1
kellys_eye
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Default Building cases for equipment etc...

I often find myself looking around DIY and household goods stores with an eye open for items that can be re-purposed to use as cases for home-built projects. Modern equipment cases can be extremely expensive.

Whilst in the local DIY shed I picked up a packet of laminated floorboards - available in practically every wood finish under the sun and the packet I got was for 1.5m^2 coverage.

It is basically a 'veneered' 6mm MDF, interlocking with hardly a visible join and can be cut/chamfered to a neat 45 degree edge and glued, with battens, into any size case you like. The finished article is rather impressive (I'll post some examples shortly). If I could be bothered to purchase/use a router I reckon the results would be indistinguishable from anything a professional could do!

Either way, the £15 I paid for the whole pack supplies enough case-making material to cover any eventuality and for years to come. I'm even considering making cases for 'all' the homebrew equipment I have - a full matching set!

Worth considering if you wish to build a valve radio from scratch and need a suitable 'wood' case.

Anyone else come across useful cases or materials to make such?
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Old 12th Dec 2016, 11:54 pm   #2
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Default Re: Building cases for equipment etc...

Glue in a bit of aluminium foil on the inside and you have a screened case as well.

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Old 13th Dec 2016, 12:30 am   #3
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Default Re: Building cases for equipment etc...

Not enclosures but I use 15mm PVC pipe from Wickes to wind inductors around. 2m is £2.67 which is an awfully large amount of inductors!

Anything sub-1MHz-ish and low voltage tends to end up inside poundland Tupperware.

I've used cardboard boxes as temporary speaker enclosures too and they don't sound too bad!
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Old 13th Dec 2016, 12:52 am   #4
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Default Re: Building cases for equipment etc...

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Originally Posted by Radio Wrangler View Post
Glue in a bit of aluminium foil on the inside and you have a screened case as well.
Bit extreme, I know, but I use self adhesive copper tape for screening! 20m reel, 30mm wide cost me around £7.50 (delivered) and it also doubles up as simple pcb track tape. Sticks wonderfully, doesn't come away with heat (unless you're brutal) and can be cut to real fine widths using a Stanley blade!
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Old 13th Dec 2016, 12:59 am   #5
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Default Re: Building cases for equipment etc...

Hi,
I like to make things out of mostly rubbish! In the thread about vintage torches I showed the 2 vintage style LED torches I made from a baked bean can, aerosol can and some scraps of sheet aluminium. I also made a case for a digital clock in a half size baked bean can (I think it might have actually contained pineapple slices..) with polished wooden sides, the wood was also scrap, chopped off the mitred ends of some CLS timber.

I built a 7" LCD monitor (at work one day!) using a cardboard box covered in a sort of self adhesive felt/carpet type stuff, with some old aluminium 3.5" to 2.5" hard drive adapter plates to fit all the electronics onto. I also made a better version using a 8.9" LCD screen in a home made aluminium case covered in carbon fibre effect vinyl wrap for cars, This one was made with some large offcuts of 1.5mm sheet aluminium bent to shape.

I did build a case for a 4.5" black and white TV when I was back at school using some laminate flooring leftover when my Dad did the kitchen floor! Took ages to file out the hole for the CRT!

I also had some speakers in cardboard boxes! They do sound surprisingly good!

I always keep an eye on scrap bins at places I've worked, as there usually ends up being good materials and even complete items getting ditched, and I always ask if I can have stuff, my home built burglar alarms are in nice hinged white powder coated steel boxes that were meant to be used in lift control rooms, only being chucked out as they were scratched or had bad powder coat in places. My workshop is full of scraps of wood at the moment, as I only recently built the workshop. Still trying to find uses for offcuts of plasterboard though...

Regards,
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Old 13th Dec 2016, 7:54 am   #6
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Default Re: Building cases for equipment etc...

Scrap plaster board is good for heat insulation to replace asbestos and that awful new fibre stuff that falls apart. It will not burn, any paper on it just chars.
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Old 13th Dec 2016, 12:50 pm   #7
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Default Re: Building cases for equipment etc...

Since I was a young lad I've had covetous eyes on a substantial wooden cigar box with a hinged lid that mum keeps her knitting-needles in. (I don't think she smoked the cigars herself.)
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Old 13th Dec 2016, 1:45 pm   #8
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Default Re: Building cases for equipment etc...

In years gone by, the metal Oxo tin was always a favourite. One of my first home projects used one of those. And then there were tobacco tins: you could fit all sorts of mini-circuits in those. Biscuit tins are still available, though I must admit I've never used one in a constructional sense: I still use many for storage purposes.

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Old 13th Dec 2016, 5:07 pm   #9
Karen O
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Default Re: Building cases for equipment etc...

I've used wooden bread bins as cabinets in recent years. They can be picked up for a pound or two at car boot sales and give a pleasant antique look to the finished article.

I've also applied wooden tea/coffee/sugar pots. A quick application of a hole saw, some metal grille from a DIY shed and you have very attractive speaker/amp. Assuming they're not removed by a hole saw, I ensure that any engravings are on the rear.

Other things I've collected for repurposing are: card index boxes, ferrero roche boxes, CD racks/drawers, key cupboards, jewellery boxes.

The possibilities are endless!
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Old 13th Dec 2016, 5:53 pm   #10
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Default Re: Building cases for equipment etc...

I waited for my local DIY shed to have a clear out in the flooring department and went away with a car load of laminate flooring cheap as chips.
I had to build a bench to celebrate
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Old 14th Dec 2016, 12:49 am   #11
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Default Re: Building cases for equipment etc...

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I've used wooden bread bins as cabinets in recent years. They can be picked up for a pound or two at car boot sales and give a pleasant antique look to the finished article.
Best used for tidying up breadboard prototypes?

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Old 14th Dec 2016, 10:05 am   #12
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Default Re: Building cases for equipment etc...

In QRP circles, you have absolutely no street cred until you've built a transmitter or receiver into an "Altoids" tin. (At first I assumed it was a nasty physical condition)

David
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Old 14th Dec 2016, 11:46 am   #13
kellys_eye
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Default Re: Building cases for equipment etc...

Usually the Altoids tin (plus contents) costs more than the QRP stuff that ends up inside it!
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Old 14th Dec 2016, 12:14 pm   #14
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Default Re: Building cases for equipment etc...

That's true of most things in purchased cases!

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Old 14th Dec 2016, 8:44 pm   #15
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Default Re: Building cases for equipment etc...

In the past I've made RF-tight cases by seam-soldering sheets of copper-clad PCB material together, and included triangular 'fillets' at the corners for strength and to provide something for the front/rear panels to attach to.

[hint: if you want to RF-proof things like loudspeaker-holes in such cases the metal-mesh from a kitchen sieve, trapped between the speaker and the panel works rather well]

Also a decade back I made some loudspeakers for a friend with a 120mm 'core drill' [the thing builders use to bore holes through walls to fit toilet-outlet pipes] to make holes endwise in some sections of well-seasoned oak-tree trunk from my woods. Each trunk-section then took three 4-inch speakers in a triangular layout. The result did sound rather good!
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Old 14th Dec 2016, 9:06 pm   #16
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Default Re: Building cases for equipment etc...

I scrounge the empty biscuit and sweet tins (getting rare as time goes on with plastic in favour) from the surrounding companies this time of year. Great for a quick and ugly screened box.
 
Old 14th Dec 2016, 11:39 pm   #17
kellys_eye
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Default Re: Building cases for equipment etc...

Quote:
Originally Posted by G6Tanuki View Post
In the past I've made RF-tight cases by seam-soldering sheets of copper-clad PCB material together, and included triangular 'fillets' at the corners for strength and to provide something for the front/rear panels to attach to.
I'm currently putting together a DIY speccy analyser using coper-clad boards for screening but also use copper tape to cover the edges for full screening purposes. This tape can also be used as a secure 'lid' to RF compartments and be removed using a knife blade if adjustment/repairs have to be made.

Sometimes desoldering such lids are more troouble than they're worth.
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Old 15th Dec 2016, 1:10 am   #18
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Default Re: Building cases for equipment etc...

I'm sure everyone's familiar with those metal boxes that are sunk in the wall behind switches and sockets(?)

I've seen one of those used as a screening cover on copper clad board. Not perfect of course - perhaps only good contact at a few points.

Easy to remove though - a couple of M3.5 screws.
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Old 15th Dec 2016, 6:32 pm   #19
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Default Re: Building cases for equipment etc...

Quote:
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I'm sure everyone's familiar with those metal boxes that are sunk in the wall behind switches and sockets(?)
"Adaptable boxes" are available in a variety of sizes. Most have knockouts but some are knockout-free which may be more suitable for projects.

http://www.electricpoint.com/niglon-...ish-no-kn.html

A wooden surround sleeve might be made to pretty them up.
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Old 15th Dec 2016, 7:14 pm   #20
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Default Re: Building cases for equipment etc...

You know the old saying: If theo only tool you have is a hammer....

I used to have access to a nice little workshop at work. Loads of scrap ally and all sorts of stuff, a guillotine, a folder and a turret punch. Heaven! but in the past tense. Bulldozers have roamed and little boxes made of ticky-tacky are now there.

I'd like a guillotine and a folder at home, but I haven't got round to it yet. But I do have a full TIG system. So I cut out flat bits of aluminium the hard way, and weld-up boxes when I need them. It's a powerful beastie and then I wanted a new antenna support (a swivel down folding stub mast on the gable) I sawed, filed and welded one up out of thick wall aluminium scaffolding tube. Only one pass needed!

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