Thanks, I've been playing around with a few double hinge and magnet hybrid designs and I'm pretty confident that a magnet only setup will work fine. The magnets have plenty of power up close.

I quickly q-bonded the heart cover standoff mounts to the perspex so I have a VERY strong bond. It looks pretty bad, but I think I'll paint the bottom as well so it doesn't stand out alongside the white disks...


A close-up of one of the bonds - this stuff is pretty amazing and immensely strong - just what I need since I will be applying some torque when fastening the covers and they're protruding so I don't want them to hit something and fall off.

Today I decided I'm going to finish all the small outstanding things I've started but didn't finish like the USB bracket, the bracket for the light controller and the HDD brackets.

This is the finished product - it weighs a ton now that the HDD's are mounted . I also routed the IDE cable cleanly around the cube since I don't want anything towards the front of the cube past the motherboard edge.


This is the light controller mounted. It's fastened by sprung heatsink clips since the back of the board isn't flat. I also added some foam to avoid scratching the perspex, line up the board and make everything prettier overall


The USB bracket was basically just braced and glued in position to the top panel since I made it yesterday...


The HDD brackets completed. It takes a bit of wrenching to make everything fit since there are fraction of millimeter differences in the hole spacing (something I can't really help), but it's very secure and will definitely not move anywhere . You can also see the mirror finish I added to the aluminium to make it look a bit better, although I kind of got tired when polishing the bottom brackets - hence they're not as smoothly polished as the top brackets


I will continue working on the outside panels and the magnetized heart cover tonight - will need to fabricate some more plastic clay pieces. Also, I've just realized the extent of the wiring that will need to be done for the LED's! It basically involves making about a 100 connections and soldering and heatshrinking each one individually! All the while connecting the right amount of the right type of LED in series with themselves and the correct resistors...

Anyway, we'll come to that later. I need some coffee... Will keep you guys posted

I love it! So clean and organized! Stellar workmanship man!

Yeah. Loving the standoffs. We don't get standoffs in various sizes here in India, so I just screw them into each other to create one long one

Thanks again! The standoffs are pretty easy to get here, you can buy them at pretty much any good electronics store. They are also called distance bolts. They come in lengths between 5-50mm so it's pretty handy I'm pretty sure you'll be able to find them pretty much anywhere (since I can get them in SA).

So, today was LED's and heart covers all the way...

I completed the mounting of the HDD and power LED's, the power and reset buttons as well as the magnetized rear panel. Everything went pretty smoothly (after I replaced one of the buttons as I accidentally superglued the button to its case ), and I continued mounting the covers and LED strips...

In the process of gluing the LED strips to one of the panels. The mounted heart cover is also clearly visible.


One panel done . It took a while to cut all the windows in the pewter and glue them in the correct position for each panel.


The reverse side of the panel, showing the LED strips through the slots.


Next, I decided to glue three of the panels together to make it easier (and actually to allow the UV LED wiring altogether) to route the LED wiring. You can also see I q-bonded the legs of the LED's to keep light from leaking from the bottom and causing weird light spots through the semi-opaque gray perspex.


Another shot with 5 of the 6 panels' LED strips mounted - the 6th one is the bottom panel which still needs to be drilled to mount the internals when I'm sure everything will fit. I think the silver with the gray and orange actually looks pretty cool.


The red part of the LED's connected to each other. All these wires will be routed cleanly once everything is connected. I've also epoxied three terminal blocks to give me something to route the wires to so I can connect it to the controller mounted on the other half of the cube. The UV LED's are going to be trickier since they need to be connected three at a time in series.


A closer shot of the terminals, the neodymium magnets with laminated steel on top of them and also the tactile power and reset buttons (both sides of the LED strip)...


Tonight I'll continue with some serious soldering and will see how far I can get with the wiring... Really putting my soldering skills and patience to the test.

So I've just finished the red LED wiring on 3 of the 6 panels. Just thought I'd share it with you guys. Looks pretty cool already

Wow! It does indeed look fantastic! You've done yourself proud!

The current state of the wiring. It's really starting to get apparent just how many wires it's going to take. This is the wiring of all 20 red LED's and 6 of the 20 UV LED's of 5 of the 6 panels. So there's still 44 connections to be made!

Update

Okay, so I've completed the wiring and wire routing of the top half of the cube (i.e. 20 of the 24 LED strips). I've also cleaned up the layout and stuck on all the parts to have a peak at what the final product is going to look like.

The front of the cube... The power and HDD LED's are just behind the circular cover at the top - the same placement as that of the power and reset buttons at the back of the cube.


...and the back. You can just see one of the buttons through the orange cover.


A perspective 'cause I like it...


The rear of the cube again, but with the magnetized heart cover removed. You can see the 4 holes that the cover fits into. The magnets are flush with the other side of the perspex panel so the four studs of the cover fit through the holes and just contact the magnets on the other side. You can also see the power button (left) and the reset button (right) clearly. With this configuration it prevents someone from accidentally pressing a button if they handle the cube since the circular disk completely covers them when assembled.


The heart of the companion cube . You can see the hundreds of wires covering the internal surface of the cube connecting all the LED strips... They are routed cleanly (or as cleanly as I could get them ) and superglued in place to avoid them snagging when you put the top half over the internals. The connector hanging in mid-air connects directly into the motherboard to power the LED's and to connect the buttons. The tricoloured wires at the back connects to the light controller when the halves are joined.


A close up of some of the wiring...


Well that's it. Today I'm going to drill the holes to mount the internals to the bottom panel and then glue and wire the bottom LED strips. After that all that's left is making a mechanism to allow screwing the top and half pieces together (it's going to be tricky since there's very little room - but I think I have an idea) and then PAINT!

A quick comparison with the "real" thing. Apart from the colours and the fact that the perspective is slightly different...

Very nice work that is a beautiful case

Thanks Carlos, appreciate it . Hope the paint does it justice

I am sure you will be,you doing an excellent work

If all the parts are painted, then I don't see, how you could possibly get it any closer to the original

Wow, wow, wow... Really, this looks amazing. It's by far the closest I've seen a mod come to the original.

Hi guys, just wanted to say happy new year! and to show a teeny tiny update...

The corners have their first layer of primer and some serious sanding later we have a pretty smooth surface.


Today I'll paint and sand the edge pieces (as seen in a row at the bottom) and probably start with the white on the corners. Then it's sanding again and maybe then the final white gloss layer. Will see how the pieces look . Also, I'm going to scuff the surface of the perspex a bit using 600grit sandpaper before I paint it to increase the paint strength. I've tested it and it's a lot tougher without damaging the finish.

Have a great year...

Is it wrong that this awesomeness turns me on a little?

Haha! I don't think I'm the right person to ask though...

holy socks, awesome work man!

Hi guys. Sorry for the wait but there isn't much going on in the build at the moment. I'm basically waiting for paint to dry most of the time . I think I'm going to paint to final white coat of the corners today and then everything will need a clear coat. It's been quite a challenge because the MDF edges soak up loads of paint and I didn't want to use putty or anything that will weaken the paint bond later on.

Will post some pictures soon to show the progress