General question on Enclosures

[lerameur]

Hello,

Many of you and myself build circuits on a breadboard. Its great, but Now I want to take my project outside the lab and use whenever I want to . I need to build a box with a nice panel board. Is there a company that builds custom box and panel board????

I tried before with an empty plastic box putting a LCD through by cutting out a rectangle on the front, it was ok, but did not look very professional :)

K

[rsocor01]

lerameur,

If you want to have a custom box built for you the most common way to do it is by plastic mold injection. Having somebody to make a plastic mold for you is going to cost you losts of $$$$$$$. Another option is to get a company like "Bud Enclossures" to machine a pre-made box to accomodate whatever displays or buttons that you might need for your project. They have special CNC machines so the box will look very professional. They can also build a panel board for your project.

Note: I don't own "Bud Enclossures" or work for them :).

Robert

[BobK]

Hello,

I made a project several years ago making 100 pcs. I bought some boxes from TKO. There's another company out there called OKI. They will send you a couple of free samples. After I got the samples, I made the circuit boards to fit the boxes and the mounting posts inside. They worked out great. See attached photo.

BobK

Sorry for the fuzzy picture. It was all I had on hand.

[Jerson]

Have you seen / considered this?
http://www.ponoko.com/make-and-sell/how-it-works

I haven't used their services; just read about them

[lerameur]

These are all great ideas, thank you all. I will probably in one of these directions. I just like to know if somebody sells, maybe we can call it LCD enhancer. See for most buttons, we can drill a small hole and mount the button from the top, thus hidding the ugly cut hole. But for an Lcd, it is mounted from the inside, so it is very hard to have something thats looks professionnal. I found am example of what I mean:
http://www.megadrum.info/old_site/faqs.php#Construction
scroll down a bit and you see the box with the LCD, button looks great, just the LCD. So is there a company out there that sell a type of insert to enhance the look of the LCD and at the same time hide the small crack between the case and LCD ??

K

[cncmachineguy]

Hi Lerameur, I own a machine shop, and modify enclosures for customers from time to time. "Bud boxes" are great, I have no idea about getting them to machine them for you. The standard way I have seen for a LCD is to cut the hole big enough for the screen but smaller then the edge. that way the LCD mounts tight to the inside and there is no gap. The next step is to bevel the edge all the way around so you don't have a 1/8" step . In a plastic enclosure this is quite easy to do by hand if its a 1 off. All you need is a razor knife and a flat file.

First cut the hole close with the razor knife(or saw). You could drill a series of holes first or use a dremel type tool to cut this.

Second, use the flat file to clean the hole and strighten the edges. Keep checking the fit and be patient. Then you can file on an angle to get the bevel.

[lerameur]

Hi bert, I just thought that maybe somebody invented a plastic cover of some sort, just like the one you would see for an electrical outlet, ceiling lamp ...

[cncmachineguy]

Hi bert, I just thought that maybe somebody invented a plastic cover of some sort, just like the one you would see for an electrical outlet, ceiling lamp ...

Thats a great idea, What should the outside fit? I feel like I have seen a thin plastic bezel somewhere that slid over the LCD. But maybe I saw it on some product and it was made by the company for their product.

This could warrent some looking into. Maybe google for LCD bezels.

Digikey http://www.digikey.com/scripts/dksearch/dksus.dll?Cat=524327&k=lcd%20bezel

[Archangel]

Hi Ken,
Community college machine shops usually work for pizza . . .