Artificer & Neophyte

[Tom Freeman]

Detailing how we made the bolt-on armour

So from scratch-building to a very different discipline, 3D printing.

Design

We decided we wanted to add some external "Armour" to the build, similar to what you'd see on old tanks / Warhammer figures. The initial step was to gather some designs Jay liked and get a few sketches of what he'd like it to look like:

 

After some back and forth, a design was made in Fusion 360, this was simplified to be separate corners (as we don't have to be as precise) and can be magnetized for easier transport / assembly. Jay also had the idea of adding an Ultramarines logo on the bolts.

 

Print

Then I worked on printing them, which is a fairly passive job that churns away by itself. I used matte blue filament with a fairly low layer height meaning each corner took around a day of printing, so 8 days in total.

 

Prep & Paint

Then they were sent over to Jay for some prep with some auto-body filler spray before painting each of them to match our theme, with Macragge blue spray paint, airbrushing and finally some stencils added.

Magnetizing / Finished Product

The finished corners were then magnetized and attached to the build:

 

Thanks for following!

 

 

 

 

[Tom Freeman]

Detailing our Imperial Aquila

With my 3D printer at capacity, the imperial aquila was made for us by Alex at Praetex Design.

The idea was to have something for the top of the case, that could be easily mounted to the case for transport.

Design

The process started with the design in Fusion, it was made from a combination of simple SVG shapes in layers, this was then sent across to Alex to print.

 

Printing

This was then printed by Alex, with the surface ironed for a smoother finish. 

 

Prep, Paint & Mount

Then it was sent across to Jay to be primered / painted in gold and finally mounted to the build via magnets glued into recesses on the back.

 

Thanks again to Alex at Praetex Design.

[Jfez]

Well I’m back for another final post.

I thought my previous post would be my last on the project but after spending weeks away from the PC and thoughts of PC building I wanted to reflect back on the project which feels like such a long time ago.

When we first went up to Bolton to start the Casemod Academy it really opened my eyes as to what I’d signed up for. I remember Adam giving his opening introduction to the competition and saying he didn’t just want to see 3D printing he wanted some physical modding using tools to create our projects and the reminder it was the apprentices project to do most of the work on.

It's why I decided to start documenting my progress on the forum as I wanted it to be my first hand experiences and progress made on the project.

While it was beyond my current skills to create something like the corners we had without 3D printing, I took the challenge of physical modding to heart and tried to use new tools and practical ways to modify the case. The vents of the Thermaltake CTE 660 were all cut out by a Dremel. The vents I replaced them with were all hand made by myself using a manual mitre saw to cut the corner angles, sander and band saw and then painted to fit the final design.

The front boxes which house our keyboard and screen were also all cut via using a drill and a hand saw to cut the windows out. This took a lot of measuring and second guessing before taking the plunge as to not mess up the location of the cut. These all had to be mounted within the case which again involved drilling and bolting them in place and more dremeling to make space.

Not to mention building a servo skull, something I never thought I would do.

Etching the glass was another thing I have had no experience with and with some tutorials on YouTube gambled on it. My first reaction after going to all the effort of creating the vinyl stencils was that it hadn’t worked after cleaning it off. Then after a minute or two it suddenly started to show and I think it looks really effective. 

While painting was one of the elements I was more confident with, this was still on a scale bigger than I’m used to and I think that with the extra details of weathering while hidden from afar look good when you get up close to the PC.

I am really pleased with how the PC has turned out and am proud of what I achieved. I never expected to get all the ideas we wanted into the project within the time frame and while I tried to get something done each week of the project the final weeks still felt tight.

It was hard work but definitely worth it.

Thanks again for reading.

JP

[Tom Freeman]

Cut for time

We had a lot of ideas for what we wanted to incorporate into the build, whilst most have made it into the project some had to be cut due to time constraints.

Distro Plate

The first was originally going to be a distro plate mounted in the center of the case.
We looked at Adeptus Mechanicus design that Jay liked and created a simple skull outline / cog.

This was to be mounted to the side of the case:

In the end, we decided to go for something easier to maintain being Jay's first loop and the build being shipped around.

 

Base

Another idea was to create a base for the case to stand on, similar to an industrial base from the tabletop game.

We did get an IKEA table to start work on this, as well as some industrial floor plate, but sadly this wouldn't have been able to go on display and does make the build somewhat difficult to transport:

 

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