[sdiy] Plexiglass Panels

[Adam Schabtach]

> No, but I wouldn't call aluminium "cheap". There is about 1.3 
> EUR's worth of metal in a 1U MOTM-size panel (3 mm thick 2017 A).

I'd call 1.3 EUR cheap, considering the overall cost of a module. 

> What makes metal panels expensive is that you have to have 
> them made. You can't easily cut sheet metal at home. 

Plexiglass isn't all that easy to cut and drill either. Having used both,
personally I'd rather work with aluminum.

I made a fairly cheap, metal panel just last weekend. Here's what I did:

Rather than buying plain aluminum stock, I bought a blank 19" 1U rack panel.
(I don't remember how much I paid for it; I bought it several years ago.) It
can be cut easily with a hacksaw. After cutting off the ends that have the
mounting slots, it is still long enough to make two 5U-high MOTM-style
panels. I smoothed the rough ends with a sanding drum on my drill press (a
drill press is a must if you're doing panels yourself) and drilled it with
one of those conical stepped bits. 

For the panel markings, I tried a technique I read about several years ago.
I drew all of the holes, scale markings, and labels with the Schaeffer/Front
Panel Express software and then printed the image on card stock with a laser
printer. (You could use any drawing program to do this. I used the
Schaeffer/FPE program because I'll probably have the panel fabricated by
them eventually.) I attached the card stock to the panel with double-sided
tape, trimmed the edges with a razor knife, and used a black felt-tip pen to
hide the white edges. Then I sprayed it with several heavy coats of Krylon.
I was surprised at how well it came out. At arm's length it looks like a
painted metal panel. Time will tell how durable it is, of course, but for a
prototype it's quite acceptable.

--Adam