- Joined
- Jul 6, 2011
- Messages
- 172
- Motherboard
- Asus Z170i Pro Gaming
- CPU
- i7 6700k @4.6
- Graphics
- 980ti
- Mac
- Classic Mac
- Mobile Phone
So far, I've created two versions of this motherboard tray using 5mm Polycarbonate Backlight dispersion elements from old LCDs that I retrieved from a recycling shop I used to work for.
Pre Tray
Originally, I tried mounting the board on JB Welded standoffs which never could be perfect. The boards always had a little bit of a bow in them which resulted in weak mounts, and by the end of the ordeal, I was down to about 4 mounts on an mATX board.
v1.0
This is the one that I first created using the short G5 standoffs from my original case, and has gone through a lot with me. At a point it was painted flat black and since I have used acetone (my bad) to take the paint off which resulted in hairline cracks to the tray. This tray also had nuts placed into it almost flush that would accept 6/32 standoffs if i ever needed to use an mATX board, but I never did. My mounting mechanism was originally JB Weld which looked like crap as it suffered from the same uneven pressure issue as the previous method.
The standoffs were mounted to he Acrylic using JB Weld and tape in order to get a flush mount, and was removed later. This was actually quite an effective method, and I don't think I'll be adjusting it for v2.0.
Last weekend, I unmounted the tray and as a proof of concept, I sanded down all of the JB Weld in my case and used 3M Command strips to see if it would hold an ATX board and 3 GPUS. Surprisingly, It held with just 4 strips, but there was a balance issue and it would vibrate against the case which required another strip to be fixed.
v1.1
This version was basically a test bench and used the leftover longer standoffs and was never really mounted inside a case, but was used extensively when I needed a desktop, but I was also working on my case. Eventually though, it was broken in a move and I never really bothered to fix it.
v2.0
Now that I'm laser cutting an HDD tray for my case, I decided that I would keep pushing the cutting off until all the space of the 24x24 piece of 3mm/.125" acrylic was filled, which it now is. I basically designed the parts to be welded together using acrylic glue which will make the joints really strong as they have quite a bit of surface area. To simplify, This tray is basically made from scraps of acrylic, but will be nice as an end product.
I was able to fit 2 sets of tray parts with a few spares added in to make life easier. The original plan was to use a piece of 5mm acrylic, but since I'd already bought the sheet and had space to fill, I've decided to just use that.
Heres what the assembled tray should look like:
Heres my final version of my HDD Tray and ODD swivel kit along with parts for an I/O shield shroud and the motherboard tray.
The plan is to once again use 3M Command strips as they're cheap and effective, and I haven't decide yet if I want to make it so that you can dismount it using the 3M Locking velcro strips, which would need one set of parts with the small drill holes, or just use regular double sided ones which would use both sets, but allow less space between the motherboard and tray for wire routing.
I'll be updating this periodically, and PM me if you would like the DWG files for either of the projects, and also let me know if you want a demo of how I made v1.0 and v1.1 as I would imagine most people wouldn't be laser cutting their trays.
Pre Tray
Originally, I tried mounting the board on JB Welded standoffs which never could be perfect. The boards always had a little bit of a bow in them which resulted in weak mounts, and by the end of the ordeal, I was down to about 4 mounts on an mATX board.
v1.0
This is the one that I first created using the short G5 standoffs from my original case, and has gone through a lot with me. At a point it was painted flat black and since I have used acetone (my bad) to take the paint off which resulted in hairline cracks to the tray. This tray also had nuts placed into it almost flush that would accept 6/32 standoffs if i ever needed to use an mATX board, but I never did. My mounting mechanism was originally JB Weld which looked like crap as it suffered from the same uneven pressure issue as the previous method.
The standoffs were mounted to he Acrylic using JB Weld and tape in order to get a flush mount, and was removed later. This was actually quite an effective method, and I don't think I'll be adjusting it for v2.0.
Last weekend, I unmounted the tray and as a proof of concept, I sanded down all of the JB Weld in my case and used 3M Command strips to see if it would hold an ATX board and 3 GPUS. Surprisingly, It held with just 4 strips, but there was a balance issue and it would vibrate against the case which required another strip to be fixed.
v1.1
This version was basically a test bench and used the leftover longer standoffs and was never really mounted inside a case, but was used extensively when I needed a desktop, but I was also working on my case. Eventually though, it was broken in a move and I never really bothered to fix it.
v2.0
Now that I'm laser cutting an HDD tray for my case, I decided that I would keep pushing the cutting off until all the space of the 24x24 piece of 3mm/.125" acrylic was filled, which it now is. I basically designed the parts to be welded together using acrylic glue which will make the joints really strong as they have quite a bit of surface area. To simplify, This tray is basically made from scraps of acrylic, but will be nice as an end product.
I was able to fit 2 sets of tray parts with a few spares added in to make life easier. The original plan was to use a piece of 5mm acrylic, but since I'd already bought the sheet and had space to fill, I've decided to just use that.
Heres what the assembled tray should look like:
Heres my final version of my HDD Tray and ODD swivel kit along with parts for an I/O shield shroud and the motherboard tray.
The plan is to once again use 3M Command strips as they're cheap and effective, and I haven't decide yet if I want to make it so that you can dismount it using the 3M Locking velcro strips, which would need one set of parts with the small drill holes, or just use regular double sided ones which would use both sets, but allow less space between the motherboard and tray for wire routing.
I'll be updating this periodically, and PM me if you would like the DWG files for either of the projects, and also let me know if you want a demo of how I made v1.0 and v1.1 as I would imagine most people wouldn't be laser cutting their trays.