DIY rack case?

kubeek

kubeek

New member
I just made a hedphone amp for my studio, and am looking for something to put it in, preferably rackmount.

Did someone do some chassis like this, or have some links to similar projects?

I am planning to make it probably from alu profiles, but am not really sure about that.
 
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I recently built a 2 output stereo headphone amp and I put it inside of the case of an old burnt out CD Drive, It is small and portable and looks good and best of all it sounds good.....
 
I'm really glad I read this and clicked the ikea link. I just realized that I can go to my Dad's and build a sweet rack stand now that he's obsessively buying woodworking equipment :D. All I need are the rails (well I guess I could just mount the stuff with wood screws at a slight outward angle into soft wood blocks instead...).

Nuke
 
Ok so I figured how to do it with my limited variety of profiles, I will try to draw it :)
It uses four L and two square profiles.
The only problem for me is that there are no profiles here with height suitable for 2U, so it will be about a 1/3" smaller.
Dimensions are 19" wide, 250mm long and 80mm high (2U is 88).

Anyone interested in the sketches?
 
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Thanks, but I don´t want to build a rack, but a chassis for rack mount device(for headphone amps and preamps). I will change the topic name so it will be more obvious.

edit: so I can´t change the name, so at least I highlighted the word chassis.
 
i saw a dude who rackmounted some mixer channel strips into old server equipment housings. some computer server stuff uses the same size (19") units which can fit into music racks. you might be able to find some old server units-- say from the early to mid 90's at goodwill, old used computer stores, flea markets, e to the bay, etc. for dirt cheap. sometimes the faceplates are screwed on so you can reverse them.
 
I've just rack mounted a flash card midi filer, I bought the chasis from C.P.C.
I saw some similar rack stuff on Ebay.
 
60$ for 2U chassis seems quite a lot for me, I can buy something similar here for that price.

I have quite good experience in machining, I built a similar chassis for my DIY 2x250W amp, it is only a bit less wide than 19" and doesn´t have the sides for screws. And the chassis cost me like 20$.
 
plan

So here is how it will look like, if there is anyone interested. This version is made of 4mm thick L profiles, but that seems a bit overkill for preamps and such, so I will use 2mm if i can find them somewhere.
BTW most dimensions are in milimeters, only the rack-defined are in inches.
 

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Wow, that ikea "Rast" rack unit conversion is awesome, thanks for posting that! Looks like I'm gonna be making a trip to my favourite Swedish furniture store soon!

As for a cheap rack to mount your headphone amp, or any other project for that matter: Search ebay for old, rackmount telephone, server or communications equipment. These things often come rack mounted and can be had dirt cheap as they're basically useless to most people. Then just pillage them for their enclosure. Make sure, however, that it's indeed 19"; some of that telephone and server stuff comes in larger racks too... 24" and so forth.
 
IKEA Hacker made my month

I’ve wanted to get a couple small racks for some time to clean up my DIY recording room. Read about the IKEA bedside table on IKEA Haker. Well I finally put a couple of these together and couldn’t be happier with the outcome.

I say cheers to:
http://ikeahacker.blogspot.com/2007/09/hack-bedside-tables-into-music-studio.html

By the way I picked up my rail from this site, check them out.

http://proaudiostash.com/product/19-inch-racking/rack-strip/full-hole-imperial-rack-rail/2214.shtml

Good luck…
 
pc cases into rack cases

if u are handy with basic tools you could cut up old pc cases and make a rackmount case. i'm just about finished one right now, a 1u to house my jlm baby animal preamps.
The sides of the pc case that easily screw off are usually about the same length as a rack space. mine looks a bit dodgy, but i'm gonna make like the stones and paint it black.
 
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