[Daris1015]

I just made a sidepanel for my case but i hate the look of the molding. I want to not have the molding on but the cut isnt exactly flush.. so how can i make this have a factory look?

 

[Philistine]

You could secure the window with rivets or small screws and nuts. How is the window secured right now?

 

[Daris1015]

Right now im useing double sided tape. but what i need to know is how to make the edges really clean looking. like i see pictures of people that cut their windows in and the lines are perfectly straight. i used a dremmel and mine are kind of rough.

 

[Philistine]

Get an 8-10" flat metal file and file the edges of the window in long strokes along the length of the window cutout. My first window had a few small curves in the cuts. It took a little while but I was able to straighten out the cuts. I just gently ran my finger along the cut and felt where it curved a bit and worked those areas with long strokes of the file. Don't saw at the rough areas, draw the file along them and they will smooth out. Hope that make sense.

 

[AlaskaFox]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Philistine Get an 8-10" flat metal file and file the edges of the window in long strokes along the length of the window cutout. My first window had a few small curves in the cuts. It took a little while but I was able to straighten out the cuts. I just gently ran my finger along the cut and felt where it curved a bit and worked those areas with long strokes of the file. Don't saw at the rough areas, draw the file along them and they will smooth out. Hope that make sense.

+ rep this question was on the back of my mind as well. thanks

 

[Furball Zen]

You could get small C channel molding, looks like this, think i got mine from BestByte Computers.

 

[gcampton]

Yeah i got some black u-channel (2mm) from a rubber store. The store primarily sells Rubber/Plastic pool equipment and rubber flooring, I'm sure you probably have something nearby that's similar. It's really really cheap when you buy it from these kinds of stores. Rather than relying on PC modding sites that may take a while to ship + added cost etc.

Edit: These kinds of shops also sell grommets, O-rings, Big chunky black rubber chair feet, walking cane feet, non-slip perforated matting. etc. etc. etc. Amazing what you can find once you start looking away from typical PC-mod shops and start wondering where these things came from originally.

You can get a pretty clean cut with flat files, but it still needs some paint on it to look clean. As you can see from this pic, while it's somewhat straight it's still missing something. Also use a precision file to clean it all up and make it smooth as a babies bum. Also you may want to consider rounding the corners unlike the below pic, if using U-Channel. It's hard to get U-Channel to stick when you have 90 degree corners like below. (unless you cut it into 4 pieces)

Precision files.

 

[Badwrench]

I filed mine as I am not a fan of the u-channel.

 

[Richenbals]

As previously stated, the best way is usually the most labor intensive and that rings true on this as well. The long stroke filing will get the results you desire.

I went with U-Channel molding and Velcro connection for mine. I have three different colored plexi's that I can swap out depending on how I'm feeling that week.