I have a few old Chieftech cases laying around, and since Ill be building a new PC in a coupla weeks I figgured Id take a stab at rebuilding one of them.
Pic link before I started:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811125225
Bought this case back in 2003. Was home to a 2800 Barton, a 9700 Pro, on an ASUS A7N8X Deluxe and was pretty cutting edge when I put it together. I retired this machine this spring because I didnt need 3 machines anymore. So in the closet it went.
I really like these cases and actually own 3 of them. And when I was kicking around what I wanted in a new case, and there are a few decent cases around $150 that would have filled the requirements. But Ive had a few idea that I wanted to try out on something cheap, or something I already owned. So out it came. I stripped out the old hardware and broke it all the way down. Case was in pretty rough shape, scratched, dirty ( I used to smoke in my house), and had crappy 80mm fans in it.
After I stripped it and removed the lower HD cage holder, I put the entire thing in the dishwasher to get it completely clean and ready for primer. After a wash cycle I took it out to the garage, and blew it out with my shop vac. A quik dry down with my heat gun, aka better 1/2s hair dryer, I rough sanded the exterior panels with a palm sander and some 300 grit to break up the factory finish. After a dust off, the priming began.
After 5 cans of primer, with a sanding on all external panels with some 500 grit after each coat. At this point it was ready for some slots in the mobo to hide away some wires when the time comes as well as cutting out for some 92mm fans. After cutting the slots I re-primed the areas that needed it and this is what I had:
By KaldorSteelblade
By KaldorSteelblade
By KaldorSteelblade
Now that the priming is done I needed to pick out some paint. I decided on flat black on the inside and gloss metallic on the outside. I painted the entire case flat black, including the outside. Why flat the outside too you ask? Simple, the metallic paints have less pigment in them than the solids do, so when I sprayed the metallic over I had alot darker metallic color and a much more even color. I sprayed the interior first with 3-4 light coats of flat black. After this was done I sprayed all the exterior panels with 2 coats of flat black. I let everything dry over night at this point. Tonite I got home early from work. I gave the outside of the case a quik sanding with some 500 grit and a dust down. I laid on a light coat of the metallic on everything and let it dry for about 60 minutes. After finishing up mowing the lawn, I laid down a little heavier coat of paint on everything again. Came back about 45 minutes later and everything was pretty much tack free but not completely dry. I sprayed the 3rd coat of metallic and let it dry for about 30 minutes or so. Once everything was dry for the most part I laid down a light coat of lacquer clearcoat. I let this set for maybe 15 minutes, in other words by the time I was down with the last piece, the first one was ready for a second coat. I sprayed a much heavier coat this time and set everything to dry. Came back about 2 hours later and snapped these pics:
By KaldorSteelblade
By KaldorSteelblade
The pics dont really do these pieces justice. Other than a few minor imperfections, which your unlikely to see unless you look close, the pieces turned out beautiful. The metallic with the flat black behind really looks good. The clearcoat makes it shiny and should make the finish fairly durable.
Next to come will be the build. Im looking at an E8400, a P5E Deluxe w/ Rampage bios, 8 gigs of RAM, a pair of 4870's, a Seagate 500 gig HD, a pair of DVD burners, and a Corsair HX1000 PSU. I plan on sleeving a bunch of the wires from the PSU, as well as building a harness hooked to a fan controller for the 4 92s, and the 140 in the side window.
Stay tuned.
Pic link before I started:
http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16811125225
Bought this case back in 2003. Was home to a 2800 Barton, a 9700 Pro, on an ASUS A7N8X Deluxe and was pretty cutting edge when I put it together. I retired this machine this spring because I didnt need 3 machines anymore. So in the closet it went.
I really like these cases and actually own 3 of them. And when I was kicking around what I wanted in a new case, and there are a few decent cases around $150 that would have filled the requirements. But Ive had a few idea that I wanted to try out on something cheap, or something I already owned. So out it came. I stripped out the old hardware and broke it all the way down. Case was in pretty rough shape, scratched, dirty ( I used to smoke in my house), and had crappy 80mm fans in it.
After I stripped it and removed the lower HD cage holder, I put the entire thing in the dishwasher to get it completely clean and ready for primer. After a wash cycle I took it out to the garage, and blew it out with my shop vac. A quik dry down with my heat gun, aka better 1/2s hair dryer, I rough sanded the exterior panels with a palm sander and some 300 grit to break up the factory finish. After a dust off, the priming began.
After 5 cans of primer, with a sanding on all external panels with some 500 grit after each coat. At this point it was ready for some slots in the mobo to hide away some wires when the time comes as well as cutting out for some 92mm fans. After cutting the slots I re-primed the areas that needed it and this is what I had:
By KaldorSteelblade
By KaldorSteelblade
By KaldorSteelblade
Now that the priming is done I needed to pick out some paint. I decided on flat black on the inside and gloss metallic on the outside. I painted the entire case flat black, including the outside. Why flat the outside too you ask? Simple, the metallic paints have less pigment in them than the solids do, so when I sprayed the metallic over I had alot darker metallic color and a much more even color. I sprayed the interior first with 3-4 light coats of flat black. After this was done I sprayed all the exterior panels with 2 coats of flat black. I let everything dry over night at this point. Tonite I got home early from work. I gave the outside of the case a quik sanding with some 500 grit and a dust down. I laid on a light coat of the metallic on everything and let it dry for about 60 minutes. After finishing up mowing the lawn, I laid down a little heavier coat of paint on everything again. Came back about 45 minutes later and everything was pretty much tack free but not completely dry. I sprayed the 3rd coat of metallic and let it dry for about 30 minutes or so. Once everything was dry for the most part I laid down a light coat of lacquer clearcoat. I let this set for maybe 15 minutes, in other words by the time I was down with the last piece, the first one was ready for a second coat. I sprayed a much heavier coat this time and set everything to dry. Came back about 2 hours later and snapped these pics:
By KaldorSteelblade
By KaldorSteelblade
The pics dont really do these pieces justice. Other than a few minor imperfections, which your unlikely to see unless you look close, the pieces turned out beautiful. The metallic with the flat black behind really looks good. The clearcoat makes it shiny and should make the finish fairly durable.
Next to come will be the build. Im looking at an E8400, a P5E Deluxe w/ Rampage bios, 8 gigs of RAM, a pair of 4870's, a Seagate 500 gig HD, a pair of DVD burners, and a Corsair HX1000 PSU. I plan on sleeving a bunch of the wires from the PSU, as well as building a harness hooked to a fan controller for the 4 92s, and the 140 in the side window.
Stay tuned.
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