Project: The Little Owl

g1lgamesh

ONCE all the drilling has been completed it is time to sand everything down ready for spray-painting.

Using 80 grit sandpaper I sanded all of the base plate down.

NOTE YOU DO NOT NEED TO GET RID OF ALL THE ANODISING!! Simply enough to roughen it up to allow the paint to take a grip.

Once completed you need to DE-GREASE and clean the plate. I use either liquid hand soap or dish washing fluid with hot water.

Afterwards DRY the plate properly (you dont want a lizard skin effect trust me)

Once completed leave to stand for a few hours, then your ready for your first coat of primer!

REMEMBER

Many layers of THIN COATS are better than just one thick coat.

Sorry for the lack of focus here, the camera went a bit weird on me.

watch out for runs, if you find any wait until the plate is dry then sand down with 5-600 grit sandpaper.

I leave 3 hours to dry, sand down with fine sandpaper in preperation for the 2nd coat of primer

I dont wantto put my usual three coats of primer on as this all has to fit back together again. So two should do.

I left the last coat of primer to dry overnight and on goes the first layer of gloss white paint:

dont worry if the first coat of white gloss is thin and patchy, thats for the reason its meant to be (remember about using thin layers?)

REMEMBER TO FINELY SAND BETWEEN PAINT LAYERS (as you would on the primer stage) so that the next layer of paint can grip (leave a couple of hours between each stage)

After the 2nd layer

still patchy but not as bad.

Use 600 grit sand paper and sand again once dry

Once the third layer has been applied WAIT AT LEAST 48 HOURS BEFORE application of the clear protective coating.

After this has been completed

g1lgamesh

Next stage is the Drive Bay area

as you can see this has had a really good sanding down.

After using two coats of primer, drying and sanding

Using polar white for this in order to create a more balanced feel inside the case.

bought this nice handy attachment at wilkinsons

Once all the sanding/washing/primer/paint and clear protective coating has been applied...

Motherboard tray all marked up

g1lgamesh

FRONT panel sanded down, just before washing

after washing, two coats of primer and then sanded down with 600 grit paper.

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PCIE Section.

FOr this I used two coats of primer, two coats of Hycote Tango Red (Metallic) and a coat of crystal silver (same company)

FOr this I didnt just wish for a candy effect, one wanted a kind of a cloud/mixed colour painting

Anyway I applied the crystal silver coating whilst the tango red was still wet in order to achieve this effect.

this is before the clear protective coating has been applied.

g1lgamesh

First of all made a bit of a mess drilling these holes. These are for the LED's the will be mounted near the edge

I never realised how thin the aluminium was, well at least the LED's are going underneath the motherboard in order to create a nice backlit effect.

g1lgamesh

next we have the back panel

Before sanding and de-greasing

After two coats of primer and a good sanding down

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Some more shots of the same plate but on differing light conditions.

next the cross struts

After the usual sanding, de-greasing and primer etc

Finally I used Polar white on the outside

And gloss white on the inside.

this is the first coat only. note i havent coated this side of the ends really. The reason for this is that all this has to be assembled again:)

Plus this side of the ending section is never seen as it slots into the front and back panels

g1lgamesh

Finished cross struts

Polar white on the outside

and gloss white on the inside:0

Backing plate m/b tray area

Nice smooth job even if I have to say so myself:D

g1lgamesh

Redid mother board tray.

I cannot alter the slight messup I did with the LED holes, however at least I can repaint the aforementioned tray.

This now marries with the PCIE backing plate.

This is before the clear protective layer has been added.

g1lgamesh

Front Panel outside

After de-greasing and priming (as shown earlier)

To get this look, I used 'Polar White' then masked the first 8.5cm off the bottom as this will be for the red colour.

The red used is a Metallic Hycote 'Tango RED' which goes fairly well with the off-white, but it is still a little harsh even though its a lot more classy than what I call 'Slapper' Red.

To balance it out a little i sprayed a fine mist of crystal silver so it appears there are clouds within the red.

As you can see there is still a small issue to fix on the bottom right near the colour line.

The inside was essentially the same as above, however gloss white was used instead.

g1lgamesh

First of all

First Side panel completed

Please note all photos are taken before the final clear protective layer has been added, the reason for that is that I allow a MONTH to cure!

Side panel outside

Side Panel inside.

Ok next

The only spare NEW spacing style rad i have right now is an Old Black Ice GT Stealth. UV BLUE at that =yuucccccccccck. Obviously the colour doesnt go with the builds......

So after some painting and yes i had to paint the fins:(

Due to paint type it wont effect the performance very much

it now looks like this:

The build is REALLY starting to come along now:)

tom1

very nice look the twin color

One1ros

Great painting work, mate!

Waiting for moar!

g1lgamesh