The Computer Installation

I made some good progress over the weekend. I decided that the shell was far enough along to start cramming all of the computer parts inside. I built a "shelf" above where the speaker bar will go as a starting point for the installation. The plan was to cut a 120mm hole in the middle and mount a computer fan underneath to push air up through the shell and eventually out the vent on top of the back panel. I also wanted to build a vertical shelf to mount the motherboard and hard drive to which will straddle the fan.

This is the vertical shelf - really simple. It is made up of three MDF panels and I cut a semicircle cut out of the bottom:

The next thing I did was install the monitor in place. I used a few screws to secure it to the frame. Space was VERY tight here and I noticed the MDF pulling apart where the screws are so I added a few extra screws for added support (more than shown in the picture).

Also, before attaching the monitor, I installed the black weatherstripping around the monitor opening. This was tricky and ultimately didn't come out as precise as I wanted it to but it is barely noticeable. If I ever build something like this again I'm definitely going to use 1/4" Plexiglas for the front panel so I can route out the channel for the transducer wedge and everything will sit nice and flush. No big deal but since I'm mostly building this on the fly there are a few things I would do differently next time...

The shelf is secured to two 3/4" dowels I glued to the inside of the shell. The vertical shelf will be positioned directly above the fan so the hard drive and motherboard will remain cool while the jukebox is on. Everything else I cram in there will be based off of the placement of these major components.

More later.