The (now the death of) Dolby DP600 Build (BEYOND COOL BUT PIC HEAVY)

[Topcat]

Re: The (now the death of) Dolby DP600 Build (OK, this one is BEYOND COOL)

Yay for a recapped power supply...not sure why I wasted time taking pics of this.....but I did it anyway....





Fresh caps...



Back together....



Clean outputs....



I had to slip everything back into the rack, and get it out of the way....





....because of this! Yes, someone wants this fixed at all costs....it fits a custom entertainment center they had built back in the day, nothing modern fits it correctly....or so they tell me....but if they want to pay me to fix it, the customer is always right!

[Topcat]

Re: The (now the death of) Dolby DP600 Build (OK, this one is BEYOND COOL)

Didn't have a lot going on today.....so dialupers, grab your asses and make a wish!! ...along with some new swear words!

If you were wondering what I was going to use that motherboard tray for that was scrapped from a junk case, you're about to find out. It is replacing what once was the SBC backplane....as I needed to be able to mount a multitude of different boards to this....so here we go!!



The standoffs, this is why I didn't pull them when I removed the PICMG tray....



I test fitted, and the standoffs are placed just perfect for this tray....but now I need to figure out how to know where to drill; IE marking the holes.....hmmm...not that bad.

Some white heatsink grease!!



Standoffs gooped up!



Then place the tray carefully over the standoffs:



Now I know where to drill!!



...and done! Tray fastened down.





Motherboard standoffs secured into the tray for minimal mounting points (basically just to keep them from moving around)....Motherboards that will fit:

Small:



Medium:



Large:



...and Extra Large!!



There were some other things I test fitted as well that was a success, but I left it out for a reason. Those details will come out a little later. The next task is fitting the 120MM former midplane fans mentioned earlier in the thread.

The entire midplane disassembled.



Test fitting. I had to remove those cover plates, the screw heads interfered with the fan bracket.



Yea baby, this can work! Holes marked and here we go!!




On the top edge, I had to drill new holes so they lined up with the fan bolts. THis was a tad tricky because the holes were so close to the edge. I had to drill these very carefully....but they came out spot-on.



Along the bottom edge, I reused some of the old rivet holes that the card slot case (now removed) once used. I just widened them out to accommodate the larger screw...and of course drilled corresponding holes in the fan bracket.



Damn, I'm good!! All lined up perfect!!



Yes Momaka; DEBURRED!!!



Fastened in.









I reversed them so they're drawing air in from the rear and blowing forward. These move some serious air @ 12V.



Both of them pulling damn near an amp!!



This task now completed.



Now remounted the original power supply from the Dolby unit back into it's original place.





HMMMM....



More to come!

[Topcat]

Re: The (now the death of) Dolby DP600 Build (OK, this one is BEYOND COOL)

Another day piddling with this....its rainy & crappy, what better way to waste it!

If you remember the "HMMM..." from the last picture in the previous post... The 'HMMM' thing was pondering a mounting tray for various things that needed to be installed inside this. I wasn't overly thrilled with the one I was 'HMMing' about....so I found one better....

Here's where it needs to reside:



...and here's what I found... Ironic enough, it's the original PICMG backplane mount that was in the Secore box. It's now going to be modified for use in the Dolby box, as I needed a raised platform to allow for fasters without having to drill through the entire project and possibly have interference issues on the opposite sides.



Test fit; absolutely perfect fit!! The standoffs on the Dolby box are basically an ATX pattern with the CPU backplates onboard....









Some measurements and then the same tactic as before with the white thermal paste on the standoffs to mark the holes to be drilled.



Perfection!





Now the first things that need to be mounted.....some large shunt resistors for one of the functions of this goofy thing...



Holes marked & drilled.





Shunts fastened down.



This is why I wanted the raised platform, there's ~3/8" of space under this tray for hardware.



Yeah baby! I am leaving the existing standoffs on the tray, handy place to potentially mount things in the future. If I pop them out, they can't be reinstalled....so I'll leave them in place for now... If a standoff needs to be removed later because it's interfering with something, I'll yank it then....



Now this box of crap goes back to my teenage years; remains of an old car audio & car security system.....I wanted to harvest some of the wiring from it....



These are what I was after.



Another HMMMM....



...then the mail came....and the parts for this beast showed up... I haven't lost my touch!!





Now I can get that big sonofabitch off my bench!!

[Topcat]

Re: The (now the death of) Dolby DP600 Build (OK, this one is BEYOND COOL)

Some more stuff is floating around in my head....so a little tinkering....



THis is the backplane & SBC from the original Secore doodiddle....I stuck my own GPU in it; that PCChips one wasn't worth a shit....not that a Matrox Millennium is anything to brag about, but it's better for sure.





I did kick the RAM up to 256mb from 128mb.....booting from a CF card with an IDE adapter....but that's it for now.



If these changes I have in mind come to fruition, the rack config will be changed around yet again.....but it's only for the better!! Progress!! This is worse than a pre-teen girl 'accessorizing' barbie dolls with new clothes!

Now for some more "can't go back" modifications.....cutting a hole in the floor...what for? A modular power interface.





Masked off and ready to butcher....err, I mean cut!



...and rough cut... I only slipped with the angle grinder twice. It was kind of tricky cutting that in such limited quarters with my pneumatic grinder.....





...but I got it on the first try...



Tape removed.



Now drilled to install the header, which has also been cut down to correct size....that was thin enough I could do it with tin snips.



...and mounted!!





Yea, I could have done a better job with the grinder. I will use the smaller one next time....and with this thing, there will be several 'next times' with cutting holes...





Now if you're wondering what fits these, it's the modular accessory wires from an Antec HE series power supply.... I have gazillions of these. The PSU that donated the interface was a 550W that had weird issues that I couldn't seem to figure out....so I scrapped it for its modular interface connectors.



Clean interface when needed and also when NOT needed!!



Tray reinstalled.



Here's a hint...that's an eATX motherboard with a full length GPU....so nothing else in testing will ever encroach on that interface.



PSU reinstalled.



Yup, all still Ratdude's fault.....but it's getting fun for sure!!!

[Topcat]

Re: The (now the death of) Dolby DP600 Build (OK, this one is BEYOND COOL)

The last week or so, I've been toying with some additional display ideas. For some additional functions I'm adding, extra displays would be very helpful versus always having to use the same one through a KVM. I'll still use a K & M functions of the KVM....but what about displays?!? hmmm... I have those 2x 6" displays from the Dolby & sencore units, but here's the problem....the highest resolutions they do are 640x480.... Every utility I would be utilizing requires 800x600....and would be illegible on those....yes I tried.

....so after a lot of looking around at many open-frame & enclosed 4:3 displays 6" or larger but under 10" I stumbled upon some "Earth LCD" fully enclosed 8" industrial displays with a native resolution of 800x600! YAY! New from the maker, they're ~$350, $425 for the touchscreen models. I found some on ebay; only one person had them...and seems to have a bunch...but long story short, I lowballed $25ea for 4 of them and that was that. The current config I have in my head, I'll only need 2, but I grabbed a couple extras just incase. Coincidentally, they are the touchscreen models.

These things are built like tanks. Solid steel frames, not plastic. They can be pedestal mounted oropen-frame / flush mounted. I'll have to play around with which method I'll use.

Anyway.... Here's 3 of the 4:



One lit up. Ignore the poor image, I snapped the pic before pressing the 'auto adjust' button....







They will also display 1024x768, but text isn't very legible....but the Sencore test patters appear nice at that resolution.



Now here's where it gets even better! Here's a view from the back, side, and bottom:







Notice the nifty flange & mounting holes? This would flushmount very nicely to a 4U rack filler panel with minimal fabrication and a stellar clean look!! All the power & interface connectors would be on the inside as well. This is the way I will probably mount them.... Two of them can be side by side and fit comfortably within the 19" rack clearance.

...but here's the other method:

It sports a pattern utilized by a standard pedestal mount.....



The ball mount that came with it, but I don't have the other portion....so I removed it.



Some old cellular phone car mounts from back in the 90's.....How I've kept these all this time is beyond me!





Just a little test....





This could make them mountable in many different ways inside the cabinet.....



.....yea, so much fun; all Ratdude's fault! As a matter of fact he'll get to see this in person over the weekend!!

[ratdude747]

Re: The (now the death of) Dolby DP600 Build (OK, this one is BEYOND COOL)

.....yea, so much fun; all Ratdude's fault! As a matter of fact he'll get to see this in person over the weekend!!

What have I done???

Blame my wife and mom... they discovered the racks at Purdue University Surplus...

And I sure will... but the goodies I'll be hauling have or will (likely) have their own threads

[Topcat]

Re: The (now the death of) Dolby DP600 Build (OK, this one is BEYOND COOL)

What have I done???

Blame my wife and mom... they discovered the racks at Purdue University Surplus...

And I sure will... but the goodies I'll be hauling have or will (likely) have their own threads

It's always good to see you.

Anyway, I dissected one of these displays. One of them has some pretty deep scratches on the front, I wanted to see if the digitizer was separate from the actual LCD, common in industrial stuff versus consumer grade junk. Of course this is me, I also wanted to see what made them tick!!

Sure enough, the digitzer is an entity all of its own!





For what I'm doing with these, the scratches don't really bother me....they're totally usable....but here they are:



The pristine LCD underneath. No, the glass panel isn't a polarizing, the LCD displays fine with the digitzer removed.



The innards... Also note the mounting holes in the casing it self....these will mount flush very nicely!



...and the overview...



More later...

[momaka]

Re: The (now the death of) Dolby DP600 Build (OK, this one is BEYOND COOL)

Didn't have a lot going on today.....so dialupers, grab your asses and make a wish!! ...along with some new swear words!

My internet connection had no sweat delivering this... but the Pentium 4 CPU in my PC was like, hold on, I need to think this through for a few moments while loading the page.

I test fitted, and the standoffs are placed just perfect for this tray....but now I need to figure out how to know where to drill; IE marking the holes.....hmmm...not that bad.

Some white heatsink grease!!
https://www.badcaps.net/forum/attach...1&d=1624661743

Standoffs gooped up!
https://www.badcaps.net/forum/attach...1&d=1624661743

Then place the tray carefully over the standoffs:
https://www.badcaps.net/forum/attach...1&d=1624661743

Now I know where to drill!!
https://www.badcaps.net/forum/attach...1&d=1624661743

Smart!
I probably would have just measured everything, simply because I can't allow myself to waste even cheap white thermal compound.

Motherboard standoffs secured into the tray for minimal mounting points (basically just to keep them from moving around)....Motherboards that will fit:

Small:
https://www.badcaps.net/forum/attach...1&d=1624661743

Medium:
https://www.badcaps.net/forum/attach...1&d=1624661743

Large:
https://www.badcaps.net/forum/attach...1&d=1624661743

...and Extra Large!!
https://www.badcaps.net/forum/attach...1&d=1624661743

Cool!
But let's be honest - who's going to put just a small or medium mobo in there and leave the rest of the case empty like that. It's mike going to McD's and ordering nothing else but one order of small fries. Seriously, when is the last time anyone ever saw something like that happen? (And on that note, I haven't been to any fast food joint in probably a good 3-4 years now, if not longer... so IDK, maybe things have changed now?? )
I approve of the eATX mobo use, though.

Yes Momaka; DEBURRED!!!
https://www.badcaps.net/forum/attach...1&d=1624661743

LOL! This won't get old anytime soon, will it?

Both of them pulling damn near an amp!!
https://www.badcaps.net/forum/attach...1&d=1624661743

Proper nail/finger choppers!

Now the first things that need to be mounted.....some large shunt resistors for one of the functions of this goofy thing...
https://www.badcaps.net/forum/attach...1&d=1624748711

Just tell us what is it already!

Now this box of crap goes back to my teenage years; remains of an old car audio & car security system.....I wanted to harvest some of the wiring from it....
https://www.badcaps.net/forum/attach...1&d=1624748711

Haha, that's awesome!
Maybe you should take the title of master hoarder from me.

...then the mail came....and the parts for this beast showed up... I haven't lost my touch!!
https://www.badcaps.net/forum/attach...1&d=1624748711

Wow!
I haven't seen anyone fix CRT TVs in a long time. Looks like HOT and vertical deflection ICs failed? What was the cause? Bad solder joints?

THis is the backplane & SBC from the original Secore doodiddle....I stuck my own GPU in it; that PCChips one wasn't worth a shit....not that a Matrox Millennium is anything to brag about, but it's better for sure.

LOL!
You know a video card is bad when even a Matrox Millennium is a better alternative.

Now for some more "can't go back" modifications.....cutting a hole in the floor...what for? A modular power interface.

Still trying to bend my mind what this "thing" is going to be. And still not having enough brain cells to figure it out yet (or they just lazy. )

Some old cellular phone car mounts from back in the 90's.....How I've kept these all this time is beyond me!

Master of all hoarders confirmed.
.
.
.
I wonder what kind of changes/additions the next update is going to bring to this project

[Topcat]

Re: The (now the death of) Dolby DP600 Build (OK, this one is BEYOND COOL)

I wonder what kind of changes/additions the next update is going to bring to this project

Well, there's the new old goodies that are under the bench....

[Topcat]

Re: The (now the death of) Dolby DP600 Build (OK, this one is BEYOND COOL)

Ok, I know there hasn't been a lot of updates....I haven't had a lot of free time to tinker with this.....but it's time for her to reveal one of her little secrets of function.... I've been getting increased requests for data destruction....and I've got a medium size plastic tote full of HDD's, plus a bunch of systems with HDD's in them from a couple EDU drop-offs, and a couple older rack servers with some SAS HDD's in them...all these need to be wiped.....

So...now as to what's going to be revealed....the function of these 2 Antec racks. Disk diagnostic & data destruction terminals. These two will be identical to eachother, but I don't have all the goodies I need for both....so I needed to get one of them kindasorta working so I can nuke these drives... Having a motherboard laying loose or a half disassembled tower on the bench with a bunch of drives connected to it is a big pain in the ass and ties up that section of the bench for days on end if there's a lot of larger drives....so this needed to be done.

...and here we go!! Still the same X8SAX with hexcore Xeon @ 3.46GHz & 24gb RAM. The GPU is a 4x PCIe G550, blisteringly fast GPU.....but uses pretty much no power. Perfect for this task, since there was no onboard. Controller is an Adaptec ASR-5805 SAS/SATA 2....perfect for this task as well. Older controller with a more 'legacy' type firmware/BIOS but will do fine with SSD's and SAS. The nice part of the firmware, it supports JBOD without a bunch of hassle, unlike Modern LSI/Avago controllers; where a JBOD config can be a real pain, if it's even supported. With this critter, fire the system (with or without the drives installed, it doesn't matter). Enter controller BIOS, rescan for drives if hot-swapped, once drives are seen, initialize, and reboot...by default, they're all exported as JBOD if no RAID is configured....then boot to whatever utility you need; DBAN or Hiren's for instance. They're visible and ready to roll.





Now for the hot swap bay. That's one thing I wish this case had was room to house 2 of these, but each case can only take one. These are tool-less & trayless, hot swappable SAS cages. They're built like tanks, all solid aluminum & steel, no plastic. They're normally ~$110ea, I got these used for about 25% of that. On top of the boxes are some IcyDock 3.5" to 2.5" adapter trays....and I'll get back to those later.



Things starting to go together. Yes, this case could have been designed a little better, such as the PSU being put in the rear, which would have allowed additional 5.25 bays up front....but it is what it is I suppose....and I'm not buying new racks....I'll just work with what I've got.



Hotswap bays mounted in the Antec drive cage....



That bottom bay will not go to waste. I am in the process of selecting a 4-bay 2.5" hotswap bay that can take both SATA and SAS, but tool-less/trayless. Tool-less & trayless is a critical feature, as it eliminates parts to end up broken or hardware that would get lost. I want to just insert the drive, do my thing, and yank them out when done.....so there's still a little more work to be done on these after this post.....



Installed.







Now to test this thing.....



The controller BIOS I previously mentioned. There's a mix of SATA and SAS drives here; the SAS in one of those IcyDock trays.



...and DBAN...







Ok, now for those little plastic IcyDock trays....and the very minor complication they presented. They too are tool-less....but were never intended to run SAS....



The SATA keyway...



I very carefully carved the keyway out with a fresh razorblade. The cut looks like crap in the pic with the flash, it really isn't that sloppy....but you get the idea.



Fits like a glove!!



...and success!! The controller sees the SAS drive!



It's up & running and performing its duties as I type....I still ahve a few more touches to add to this.....but atleast now this mystery contraption is working.... When these two are complete, each system will be able to handle up to 7 SSD or spinning drives; either SAS or SATA. I omitted SCSI and IDE, as I seldom encounter either anymore; atleast from customers.

[Topcat]

Re: The (now the death of) Dolby DP600 Build (OK, this one is BEYOND COOL)

The real fun hasn't even really begun.....but showing some signs of life...

[Topcat]

Re: The (now the death of) Dolby DP600 Build (OK, this one is BEYOND COOL)

Finished 1 of 2 for the HDD diag & wipe systems. That last 5.25 bay is now filled with a 4 drive hot swap bay. This can support 7mm and 9mm drives, but not the 12mm ones. The 12mm are too tall. It will support SAS.





All bays loaded with 7 drives.





Fired up!





Seen by the controller.



Seen by DBAN



7 simultaneous drives seems to have the controller at max capacity for throughput! At 3x, things were running at the speeds they should have.....but 7 slowed it down a tad!!



As everything settled in, throughput averaged out among the 7 HDD's, but still capped at the internal controller speed of ~300mb....but get a load of the load averages; the CPU is a Westmere Xeon hexcore @ 3.46. I've played around with the idea of running two controllers; those ASR-5805's can be had all day long for ~$10...that would split the load; theoretically doubling the throughput.



I probably don't really need a second system just for this task, the one would probably be able to handle it....but I have most of the stuff for the second one to be completed.... I'll ponder that one, but for now this one is holding its own. The majority of the drives have already been wiped.

[Topcat]

Re: The (now the death of) Dolby DP600 Build (OK, this one is BEYOND COOL)

...and the 'morning after' followup:

It didn't take 2 days (48hrs) as DBAN was suggesting....once the smaller drives finished up, it freed up controller bandwidth for the larger ones. It took ~20hrs to wipe this batch of 7. Not bad considering....and yes, it would have taken longer had all the drives been larger (naturally).... Still kicking the idea around of multiple controllers.....







Other than some tweaking & tinkering, one of the functions of this beast is up & running!

[ratdude747]

Re: The (now the death of) Dolby DP600 Build (OK, this one is BEYOND COOL)

Saw this video, and thought of this built:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BZ_bdaoqNJE

Socket 8 SBC!

[Topcat]

Re: The (now the death of) Dolby DP600 Build (OK, this one is BEYOND COOL)

Saw this video, and thought of this built:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BZ_bdaoqNJE

Socket 8 SBC!

I've actually seen a socket 8 SBC before, and really didn't think much about it....I probably should have grabbed it....but I do have a couple Skt8 jewels including a dual Skt8 overdrive... Definitely a neat build.

[momaka]

Re: The (now the death of) Dolby DP600 Build (OK, this one is BEYOND COOL)

but it's time for her to reveal one of her little secrets of function.... I've been getting increased requests for data destruction....and I've got a medium size plastic tote full of HDD's, plus a bunch of systems with HDD's in them from a couple EDU drop-offs, and a couple older rack servers with some SAS HDD's in them...all these need to be wiped.....

Yay, the moment we were all waiting for.

So now you can basically put back to good use all of those old HDDs, right? If so, that's really awesome, TC! So many "recyclers" out there simply just bin the drives (and other hardware) simply for the metals in them. This (wiping and re-using) just makes so much more sense! And 2nd hand HDDs are always needed too.

I suppose the next step would to land some bigger recycling contracts with data centers, universities, and other organizations - that will probably allow you to put all of those machines back for re-use again. (And reduce waste.)

Really cool!

Having a motherboard laying loose or a half disassembled tower on the bench with a bunch of drives connected to it is a big pain in the ass and ties up that section of the bench for days on end if there's a lot of larger drives....so this needed to be done.

True.
I mean, something like that can work for a really small business that doesn't see too many HDDs that need wiping. But when you have a lot of HDDs, it really does make sense to build a station specifically for that purpose that requires minimum effort to do this task. (Plus, it looks more professional if a customer ever wanted to know what your data destruction/wiping process is. Seeing a proper machine built for the task probably inspires a lot more confidence than just seeing a bunch of drives lying around on a bench.)

When these two are complete, each system will be able to handle up to 7 SSD or spinning drives; either SAS or SATA. I omitted SCSI and IDE, as I seldom encounter either anymore; atleast from customers.

Understandable.
I hardly see IDE/PATA drives anymore too. I'm still guessing you save these, though, right? For older/retro builds (like Windows XP and older), the bigger PATA drives (80-250 GB range) are plenty fast. And for an old Win9x machine, even an older slower 20-60 GB is plenty fast. So hope you're not trashing them PATA HDDs.

The SATA keyway...
I very carefully carved the keyway out with a fresh razorblade. The cut looks like crap in the pic with the flash, it really isn't that sloppy....but you get the idea.
Fits like a glove!!

Nice! Who needs SAS to SATA interposers, right? Just make your own.

As everything settled in, throughput averaged out among the 7 HDD's, but still capped at the internal controller speed of ~300mb....but get a load of the load averages; the CPU is a Westmere Xeon hexcore @ 3.46. I've played around with the idea of running two controllers; those ASR-5805's can be had all day long for ~$10...that would split the load; theoretically doubling the throughput.

If a 2nd controller is only $10... I'd probably go for it. Depends on how often and how many HDDs you have to do at once, though. You had an accumulation of HDDs that needed wiping, so in this instance, a 2nd controller would have been helpful. But once these are all cleared... if you never really get that many HDDs at once, then it might be OK to just continue with the single controller.

On the other hand, having a 2nd controller would also be nice to have as a backup, in case the 1st one ever goes down for some reason.

Other than some tweaking & tinkering, one of the functions of this beast is up & running!

That was just one function of many? 0.o
This is getting interesting.

[Topcat]

Re: The (now the death of) Dolby DP600 Build (OK, this one is BEYOND COOL)

Yay, the moment we were all waiting for.

The big function is still in development....but it'll really be a hoot when done!

So now you can basically put back to good use all of those old HDDs, right? If so, that's really awesome, TC! So many "recyclers" out there simply just bin the drives (and other hardware) simply for the metals in them. This (wiping and re-using) just makes so much more sense! And 2nd hand HDDs are always needed too.

I've tried to recover data using many utilities on drives wiped with dban. I have never been successful....so I'm comfortable putting wiped drives back to use. Some of the smaller ones (500gb or smaller), I simply gift to people if they can use them. I hate wasting anything.

I suppose the next step would to land some bigger recycling contracts with data centers, universities, and other organizations - that will probably allow you to put all of those machines back for re-use again. (And reduce waste.)

I don't really have any desire to process that kind of volume......I don't have the space or the time. That kind of volume would be more than just me could handle....I don't want to have to deal with employees anymore.

I mean, something like that can work for a really small business that doesn't see too many HDDs that need wiping. But when you have a lot of HDDs, it really does make sense to build a station specifically for that purpose that requires minimum effort to do this task. (Plus, it looks more professional if a customer ever wanted to know what your data destruction/wiping process is. Seeing a proper machine built for the task probably inspires a lot more confidence than just seeing a bunch of drives lying around on a bench.)

Loose drives to be wiped are locked in the safe while waiting if they came from a business. Consumer grade stuff will usually sit in the garage until ready.

Understandable.
I hardly see IDE/PATA drives anymore too. I'm still guessing you save these, though, right? For older/retro builds (like Windows XP and older), the bigger PATA drives (80-250 GB range) are plenty fast. And for an old Win9x machine, even an older slower 20-60 GB is plenty fast. So hope you're not trashing them PATA HDDs.

I do keep them, they're useful for a lot of older things, and larger PATA drives are harder to come by. I have a few 750gb PATA's I recently pulled from some DVR's that I scrapped.

Nice! Who needs SAS to SATA interposers, right? Just make your own.

The 2.5" to 3.5" tray is what was modified for SAS. The cage for the 2.5" drives can't take 10mm height drives, only 7mm....and SAS 2.5" is always 10mm thick....

That was just one function of many? 0.o
This is getting interesting.

Just give it some more time, I haven't had a lot of free time to putter with this lately.

[Topcat]

Re: The (now the death of) Dolby DP600 Build (OK, this one is BEYOND COOL)

...and here we are today, a little lul in the action around here....actually I'm just tired of working on printers, so I decided to tangle with this a little. The next function of this thing needs to become operational, as some of the changes at my front bench are putting a little pressure on this project. This one should start coming into focus a little; if it hasn't already....but here's what was done today....

First of all, this thing had to be dragged out again....



That 7u plate from earlier in the thread....seeing how it's going to fit in conjunction with another control panel that has to be fabricated.





Now for this mystery control panel...made from the original lid from this sencore chassis.

Measured off.



Marked.



Masked on the line. Incase you're wondering what the tape is for when I make cuts like this....the tape goes on the good side of the material, protects the metal if I slip and also gives a nice line to follow....as sometimes the drawn line can be harder to see.



Free-hand cut with a die grinder. I haven't lost my touch!





Edge deburred (howdy youknowwho!!) and test fitted....





Now to create some rigidity along that leading edge. This panel is 1/16" steel, its pretty stout....but that open edge was a little softer than I liked....so here's piece of 3/4 right-angle iron. Cut to size and wire wheeled the rust off it.





Marked for some holes to be drilled.



Drilled & pop riveted. There's zero movement on that edge now.





...and HMMMMM....





I can't go any further with it, I need a 1 7/8" hole saw. My set went right around that size (2" is too big and 1 3/4 is too small)...and of course that size can't be had locally, I had to order one...sonofa.....so more soon!

[Topcat]

Re: The (now the death of) Dolby DP600 Build (OK, this one is BEYOND COOL)

The 1 7/8" hole saw & arbor showed up today....talk about timing, one came from New York, the other from California....ordered within minutes of eachother, got here in the same delivery from the courier! They got here later in the day, so I didn't get as far as I wanted; which may not be a bad thing.....but here we go:

I'm glad I spent the few bucks extra, the Lenox brand was sworn by from many guys for longevity. The cheap ones most say are good for 2 or 3 holes through steel and they're shot.....I need to cut 8 at least (will be more later)... Anyway:



In the drill press.



Had to raise her hood and slow her down a little....you won't want it too fast, it'll create too much heat and destroy the saw.



Now for the fun! I had to mark things off. I'm sure you've figured out by now that there's gauges being mounted here. The footprint of where they'll be.





Now to measure & mark off where the holes have to be punch for the backings to go through and the fascias to mount flush.



...and that's as far as I got... I didn't punch any holes except in a piece of scrap metal to test the saw (it cut nicely). I'm glad I ran out of time today....this will give me the night to sleep on it and verify placement in my mind and recheck all my measurements tomorrow! I only get one shot at this!

[Topcat]

Re: The (now the death of) Dolby DP600 Build (OK, this one is BEYOND COOL)

Holes punched. No matter how accurate your measurements are and even with the accuracy with a drill press, things will always still be a hare off....but overall, nothing a little diddling with the Dremel couldn't fix and everything was lining right up!!

Holes drilled and test fitting.



Laying in there loose; gauges are in no particular order....yea, I still had to trim a little with the dremel.



Rear view. I'm sure some of you are wondering how the gauge studs will mount over the area where that gap is. That gap was originally a fan filter assembly in that old Sencore thingy....obviously it's no longer needed. The gauges were strategically placed to remove its visibility from the panel....but of course this created the problem of missing backing for the gauge studs....but stay tuned!



Yes, deburred.... ...and the answer to the mounting question.....



I took some tin snips to an old proprietary Dell PSU that was bad. and cut out a small section where there was mesh....conveniently, the mesh holes were the perfect diameter of the gauge studs....so I simply created a spreader plate and with some flat washers snugged it into place. It doesn't take much to hold these little gauges in place and the clearances in the 1 7/8 hole are very tight....it doesn't move and things are spot-on.





Everything fastened in and the sharpie markings all removed....and of course the gauges are now in their correct places.







Not bad if I do say so myself!! I didn't ruin it!!



Set in place (temporarily of course)





I still have a ways to go and more smaller holes to drill in this panel....but this was by far one of the more difficult tasks.....and I'm glad it's over!!

I still have a few things that have to be figured out layout-wise....but it's just a matter of tinkering around with placement, fitment, and function....