Freestyle Scratchbuilt Bench Build A.K.A. The 8 Hour Challenge

Hey guys, so I snagged a bunch of stuff at the Dangerden Fire Sale (Sad to see them go :sad-smile ) and I was jazzed with all of these parts headed my way and I was in the "modding" mood. However I am waiting on parts for my Bombproof Builders Desk and my Wall PC build. So knowing I needed a new benching station (traded away my Dimas) I got a crazy idea, build a bench from scratch and only give myself 8 hours to do it! Not only that but I decided I had to use free and found parts as much as possible and I had to make it up as I went along. No sketches, plans or CAD layouts. But wait theres more! I also decided I could not make any measurements, I would have to find templates or eyeball it, the only thing I could use was a strait edge, everything else would be improvised or found objects.

Now why would I put all of these totally unnecessary "limits" on myself? Well several reasons

1. If it isn't hard it's not worth doing. I live for challenge and its one of the main reason I build PC's.

2. To shake things up! I currently have my next 5 Desk/Case/Scratch builds planned out extensively (which by the way should end up being about 2 years worth of builds :thumb: ) But I can only take those on one at a time and between work, cashflow and life there can be stretches where I dont even get to work on them. By playing playing by an entirely different set of rules I force myself to think and create in entirely new ways and explore the dynamics of my creative proccess.

3. Success Teaches us nothing, We only learn from failure. I knew going into this build with these rules I was going to screw things up, but thats the beauty of this build is that every mistake I made i had to adjust to and improve upon. Even this far in I have already come up with a ton of better ways to work with my builds and perfected some of my techniques along the way.


DISCLAIMER: This is a build for the fun of it. It in no way reflects my standards for regular case modding or scratchbuilding I am just having a good time and taking the attitude of as long as it fits we're good.


Ok so lets get into this build, the platform I am going to be using is a piece of scrap plywood from my desk build. I took a broken Asus Z68 Deluxe mobo and used it as my template for my standoffs. I then drilled the holes and threaded my standoffs in very very carefully :weirdsmil

First 4 in








Pretty happy with how it lined up



Then the Rest, not perfect but close enough (30 minutes in)





But dont think I have forgotten the mATX boards!



Bah one standoff short




Now we need to mark out some cable management holes




And its off to the Sawhorses!