Cutting a PC Side Panel w/ Dremel
 

Sooo, brand new dremel, I have, under my bed.
With 409 and 420 cutoff wheels.
Since I'm brand new to cutting anything, needed some insight.

Seems to be steel as opposed to aluminum, but it's.. normal steel?

Anyways, what kind of cutoff wheel should I be using, and how can I tell in the future which I'll need?

Using a dremel will take ages and use up lots of wheels- you want the thickest & largest reinforced ones for best results. Really, I'd suggest using a jigsaw with a fine metal cutting blade- far quicker & neater results with less time required to tidy up the edges- and no chance of skipping across the panel with the blade...

[youtube]9iMiH8wYTDY[/youtube]

[youtube]WpZoE-zj0-k[/youtube]

Enjoy :yes:

It's probably painted steel to save money.

I cut metal with a dremel all the time, you just need the wheel for cutting metal.

I can cut through 8th inch steel with no issue. Of course I have the wand attachment which makes it easier to hold steady.

Interesting.
Since I'm aiming for a fan hole, I'm thinking a hole saw would be easier and much more simple...

This is a client's machine, so I'm going to need to test it out on an old case..

Even a hardware grade holesaw will be easier & quicker

Going to give Harbor Freight a visit tomorrow morning and grab this:
http://www.harborfreight.com/18-piec...set-68115.html

Hopefully it will be a decent set.

I ended up ditching the dremel method, due to my inexperience, and decided to try hole-saws, as they appeared to be a more direct, easier, and simpler method of cutting a... well, hole.

First off, let me say this was my first ever, serious mod to a PC case, and even that, it's not even a case, but rather a side panel.
Anyways, I think it came out great for a novice..

Wanting to do this on the cheap side, I grabbed a Carbon 18pc Hole Saw kit from Harbor Freight.
Man, this was a pretty bad mistake.
I saw the label where it say "For: Wood, Plastic" after I finished cutting, but hey, I can at least say it finished the job and did infact cut the steel.

It wasn't pretty, and it wasn't easy, I had to really push into the side panel to get it to cut, obviously I had to have a 2x4 underneath to support it...
In more than a few instances, the drill became a bit dangerous when it came to a torquey spot and couldn't over-do it.
I wonder if the DeWalt Impact Gun would work well... hmm.

In any case, it finished, and I'm rather pleased with the results.

Since this is a dedicated Arcade machine, being hid underneath the wood frame, color schemes and whatnot didn't matter, so I used some (very cheap) yellow sleeving (really accents the fan), but after this, I found out I ran out of my yellow fuel tubing. Yes, fuel tubing, I'm a pretty avid R/C-hobbyist, and have these tubes laying around. So I used my neon green.. also accented the black pretty well.
But together, not the hottest.
Since I didn't want an ALL positive airflow (no exhaust), I threw in a cheap Rosewill 80mm.. and be it, it was a blue fan.
That's right, nothing was matching, at all!

Now to test to see if it actually works.
Hopefully, the two delta fans (yes, delta fans, I found out that they run up to 4890RPM last night... man, these suckers really are loud.) on the side panel will keep the GPU cool, primarily the capacitors so we won't have a failure again, and the blue Rosewill exhaust will keep most of the hot air out.

Overall, the plain black case is no longer!
It looks pretty decent IMO, and since the green tubing wasn't normal u/c-channel, I had to improvise with my mounting methods.

Now that I know what I'm doing (sort of), I should be able to make the next two a lot nicer.

(I've got some leftover cheap blue/red sleeving, some red fuel tubing, and a blue fan... hmmm.).

Here's the photobucket link to anybody that wants to see it:
http://goo.gl/UVeJO

For the people who are too lazy to click on things..
Hole Saw:
http://i53.photobucket.com/albums/g6...d/IMG_6676.jpg

Some planning to be done:
http://i53.photobucket.com/albums/g6...d/IMG_6621.jpg

The fans themselves.
Note that I really didn't care about the proper sleeving job, I utilized the sleeving to keep the wires untangled.. Not for cleanliness/appearances.
http://i53.photobucket.com/albums/g6...d/IMG_6619.jpg

Very rough cuts, these almost came projectiles!
http://i53.photobucket.com/albums/g6...d/IMG_6672.jpg

Rough cuts... before sharpie cleanup:
http://i53.photobucket.com/albums/g6...d/IMG_6633.jpg

I was debating this, tubing or no tubing.... Definitely, tubing!
http://i53.photobucket.com/albums/g6...d/IMG_6651.jpg

Ahh, much better:
http://i53.photobucket.com/albums/g6...d/IMG_6652.jpg


Side Panel Itself:
http://i53.photobucket.com/albums/g6...d/IMG_6654.jpg

Profiles:
http://i53.photobucket.com/albums/g6...d/IMG_6664.jpg
http://i53.photobucket.com/albums/g6...d/IMG_6660.jpg