Bacteria and I have been sending a few pms back and forth, and I came up with the concept of the vacuum table I will build for the case. This is very heavily based on what bacteria did (which can be seen at http://modded-by-bacteria.com )
I also ordered modeling clay and putty. You might be wondering why I'm preparing to make the case already, but the answer is simple - I'm waiting for my PSOne screen. (Well, I'm waiting for being able to pay it because my bank decided to force everyone to buy a new thing which enables you to do online banking)
I'll go and buy what I need to build it on saturday. And by I'll go I mean I'll force my father to take me. I'll probably also get his advice on the thing, he usually has useful stuff to say. I'm hoping to be done with this portable at the beginning or end of january. I probably won't be able to finish it earlier because of monetary reasons. The first of the month is the time I get money and in this particular month, christmas as well. While I'm generally good at buying stuff in bulk and building stashes of things I might need in the future, i haven't bought anything case making related before this month (well, except for a dremel and a sheet of plexiglas). If I can manage to get everything done on the 35€ I have left, I'll probably be able to finish it this month.
The good news is that the next portable I make should be done faster, without annoying phases of waiting.
Good luck Kyo. I think you said you bought 500g of the clay I used for a case - I used in total (excluding remakes) about 5-6 packs of clay between the two molds; 350g each pack, so about 2kg in total. Just letting you know you might need more!
You need to plan the case layout perfectly, it takes too much effort to make one if you keep having to add new bits on before you get the final shape.
What if you bulked it out in scrap wood, then used a LOT less clay? It'd be quite a bit cheaper. If you drill a few holes into the wood support and push some clay down in them, the mold will stay in one piece.
This post brought to you by David Duchovny's glorious nipples.
No, not a good idea. I tried with plastic and then wood, clay does not stick to the material. Other problem is that when doing the vacuum forming process, a lot of pressure is put on the mold by the suction, so if you try to cut corners your mold will crack badly or cave in. I used MDF for the top plate as when I tried 3mm fibreboard it literally collapsed after only one or two uses. Suction is powerful!
Good luck Kyo. I think you said you bought 500g of the clay I used for a case - I used in total (excluding remakes) about 5-6 packs of clay between the two molds; 350g each pack, so about 2kg in total. Just letting you know you might need more!
You need to plan the case layout perfectly, it takes too much effort to make one if you keep having to add new bits on before you get the final shape.
PM me if I can help you further.
I bought 1.5kg, actually. Same brand as yours and I just received it today. It's much smaller than it looked on your pictures. But that's ok, I'm going to buy the components for the vac-former saturday anyway, so I'll just buy more. Thanks for the (late) tip, though. Now I'll know how much I'll roughly need.
As for the case, I'll see what I go with, but I won't make it before everything is wired up, so I'll be fine. But yeah, I'll probably make a drawing of that before I make it, so I'll be teslaing myself a little as well
I'm quite excited to get the vacuum former done as making beautiful things easily at home is something I've always wanted to do. I'll build myself a reprap or fabber one day too (the simple man's 3d printers, those are)
bacteria wrote:No, not a good idea. I tried with plastic and then wood, clay does not stick to the material. Other problem is that when doing the vacuum forming process, a lot of pressure is put on the mold by the suction, so if you try to cut corners your mold will crack badly or cave in. I used MDF for the top plate as when I tried 3mm fibreboard it literally collapsed after only one or two uses. Suction is powerful!
So no, make the whole mold out of just clay.
There are several ways of securing the clay to to wood that will handle high pressure. There are countless adhesives on the market that do it. In any case, if the wood is solidly encased in the clay, it's not going anywhere.
I'm not just saying crap. I am speaking from practical experience.
This post brought to you by David Duchovny's glorious nipples.
bacteria wrote:No, not a good idea. I tried with plastic and then wood, clay does not stick to the material. Other problem is that when doing the vacuum forming process, a lot of pressure is put on the mold by the suction, so if you try to cut corners your mold will crack badly or cave in. I used MDF for the top plate as when I tried 3mm fibreboard it literally collapsed after only one or two uses. Suction is powerful!
So no, make the whole mold out of just clay.
I'd with Tibia on this one. If you encase it completely you'll use less than half of the clay, and have more than double the strength.
If I remember correctly, you bulked it out and left it hollow. That wouldn't work, no. But if you keep it solid, there's no way in hell you could collapse it with a vacuum. Not even a Dyson has that much power.
Indeed, using a wood inside will save money if it works; however on my second attempt, I used MDF and covered it with clay. The result was lots of deep cracks on the clay when drying and also no adhesion to the clay itself. It is risky as you are relying on the clay to dry and not crack so it can be released from the wood so adhesive can stick it.
By all means try it out; don't be surprised if like me you end up binning it and starting again. Making it solid clay comes out perfectly however...
Actually, those are the fears I'm having myself. It will be a thinner layer of clay, and the inside, while it can't get out, won't really be sticking to it either, so it will end up breaking from the inside out.
Also, I decided to relocate the cart slot, 'cause I'm bored and feeling lucky.
Wish me luck *plays scene of putting on the helmet and walking in the rocket to deploy an atom bomb on a meteor that is heading towards the earth*
...ok now I _HAVE_ to listen to "leaving on a jetplane" while doing the work
The clay does shrink a little bit - on the size of my case, it shrank about 3-5mm in total, so I had to top it up when drying. Fortunately, as the clay is air-dry and not oven dry, it was easy to do and the clay stuck on as good as if applied originally. This is good clay!
Kyo - from what you say, as the clay on yours will be not thick, don't use wood inside, make it all in clay, or you will probably regret it for the same reasons I did before.
Bear in mind, you need to allow about 3 days before you can sand the mold properly and use it as a mold. You can use your airing cupboard to help; make sure air can go under the mold or it won't dry and will deform.
*shrug* Whatever. Just because you had a bad experience by not bonding the wood to the clay doesn't mean it doesn't work. I'll keep bulking my molds out with wood. I've never had one crack, ever.
This post brought to you by David Duchovny's glorious nipples.
8 more wires and I'm done attaching the wires to the cart slot I'm using. Then I'll just have to do the same thing on the SNES side.
Also, using a fan and opening the window makes your room REALLY cold.
The helping hand slipping away was really annoying, so I glued it in place with electrical tape. The roll is almost gone and I don't think I've used it for it's intended use a single time.
my hands are hard to move, from the cold and all the soldering. I'm also a little dizzy, but I want to finish this today (1 hour, 20 minutes and I'm off to bed - tommorow is a school day)
Bacteria - I already wrote, I won't embed wood, my budget for this month is not too big, and I don't want to end up having to do the case again, so I won't take risks. Thanks for the tips.
1) I have absolutely no self-control. I saw a PSOne screen, new, for 25€ on ebay (it got emailed to me, I wanted to not to go to ebay), so I bought it.
This means I can't really make a vacuum former till after christmas (20 days - that's bearable)
I'll try to convince my father he wants an Atari 2600 portable, and try to get him to give me the 30 € (shipping)
An alternative would be selling some stuff on ebay. Or on here.
2) Cart slot relocations suck. I probably used the f-word more often than healthy for a person and my SNES is now not reading any games. It still works, it turns on, and sometimes if I wiggle the cart it will show me some graphical glitches - but it won't read games porperly. I tried de/resoldering some of the wire, no success so far - I'll work on this more tomorrow, I haven't given up hope yet. Worst case scenario: just starting over with another cart slot
