Materials suggestion, please.

I am planning on making a case over Christmas break to house my liquid cooled computer. I have designed the case to be easy to acess and to maximize airflow where it is needed. I am also designing it to be as quiet as possible without sacrificing too much performance. The only thing I am not sure about yet is what materials to use. I will most likely use aluminum angle to create the frame, but what should I use for the panels? They need to be semi-sound absorbent and should not resonate from slight vibration. One thing I thought might work would be a sandwich of two 3/32 PVC (or some other cheap plastic) sheets and a thin sheet of rubber, soft-mounted to the chassis. Please offer up some more suggestions, and try to avoid anything prohibitively expensive.

Call around to local plastics shops to find one that sells their off-cuts and pickup some sheets of polycarbonate in either 3/16th or 1/4 inch thicknesses. It's as or more friendly to work with as aluminum and it very durable. You can even tint the sheets yourself with film or RIT dye.
It may be labeled under a handful of brands such ase GE Lexan, Tuffak, Rhinex, and Hyzod.
It's rigid enough to resist vibration and soft enough to dampen fairly effectively but you can just as well add an internal layer of dense foam if you want.

Most other plastic aren't as pleasant to work with.

Edit: Found one for you to call.

Piedmont Plastics
180 Messner Dr.
Wheeling, Illinois 60090
Toll Free: 866-449-1643
Phone: 847-459-6760
Fax: 847-459-6320
Directions on google maps

Most acrylic panels will suit you just fine. Depending on how thick you want them, you can probably do a whole case under $50. I would say, though, the thicker the better. If you are so inclined, you have the option of going clear. There are also available plastic screws you can use for joining and mounting. If you want to go as quiet as possible, get some dynamat or similar sound deadener. Adds a bit if weight, and maybe a degree or two of heat, but does appreciably lower noise.

You can find a wide variety of plastics here: http://www.usplastic.com/catalog/category.asp?catalog_name=USPlastic&Category_Name=62&Page=1

As an afterthought, if you plan on perhaps adding lighting, try to make sure that whatever you get is UV resistant.

Another retail source: http://www.mcmaster.com

Thanks for the info slug, but I will be building it back in Fort Wayne. I already know some good plastic sources, was just wondering what would be the best plastic for the job or if another material would better suit my purposes. Sounds like a rigid plastic will be my best bet, though. BTW, what would you recommend as the best tool to cut plastic with? My dad has a larger collection of equipment (jigsaw, drill presses, bandsaw, etc.) so I can probably find something that will work very well.

Stool, I have been meaning to check out some dynamat, thanks for reminding me. As for lighting, I actually find a bright case to be quite annoying and I will stick with good 'ol darkness.

Not a problem. Even though I have a bunch of lights in my case, most of the time I leave them off.

For cutting rigid plastic or acryllic, I'd recommend going to Home Depot or Lowe's and finding an Acryllic cutter. They work great, and power options tend to actually melt what you are cutting. You can use a dremel at low(very low) speed but the real plastic cutters work better.

I wouldn't use an acrylic cutter on anything other than Acrylic. And you can cut plastic sheets easily with a table saw if you use a plastic-specific blade. A bandsaw works really well too for smallish cuts but won't produce accurate cuts in larger pieces unless it's an industrial grade tool.
I also use a scrollsaw or a jigsaw for detail work.

Would Lowe's or Menards carry a table saw blade made for plastic? I don't believe I have ever seen one before.

kswaid said:

Would Lowe's or Menards carry a table saw blade made for plastic? I don't believe I have ever seen one before.

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Yep. You're looking for an 60-tooth Plastic/OBS blade. May also be listed for use with PVC.
Plastic-specific blades work best.

OK, I'll see if we have one when I after I get back in a couple weeks. Thanks for all the help, and I'll be sure to post a worklog once I get started.