22/11/2005
Have been working on this sporadically for some months now... have finally made enough progress to start a work log.
Bits n pieces:
Xenarc 700TSV
Opus PSU
DFI 855GME-MGF Pentium M Mobo
Pentium Celeron M 1.4Ghz
200Gb SATA
sony rm-x2s wired remote
The xtrail has a nice dash panel which covers the double din stereo, Air Con, vents and compartments which comes off nice and easily. Pulled this off leaving the internal bits floating around loose in the dash for a few months while I fabricated the bezel into it.
The screen bezel was attached to the dash with JB Weld... hopefully it wont crack!
Please note this is the first fabrication of this kind i have ever undertaken! Some pics:
Mounting Bezel in dash:
Filled and sanded the edges:
Final coat of paint after 3 layers of primer and 3 layers of top coat:
Close up of above:
Screen mounted:
Rear of dash piece:
Test Run:
In the last pic you can see the mobo and opus in the case, with the sata hdd sitting on top of the temporary 240V PSU. The plywood case (from ikea) might be replaced soon with a white acrylic custom case... depending on cost.. have been quoted AU$150
Update
28/11/2005
Have started making a clear perspex case. Materials are 3mm perspex (not much room under the passenger seat so the thinner the perspex the bettter), and Acrifix 192 glue.
It has been quite a challenge making the case, as I live in a 1br apartment without a garage, and my work bench is my coffee table, much to the dismay of my girlfriend. Tools are limited... the perspex was cut by scoring with a stanley knife, then snapping along the score line. this produced a straight enough "cut" to assemble a box out of. The glue is activated by fluorescent light, which I only found out after researching the product on the internet.. i couldnt work out why the glue wouldnt cure!
I am still to install two fans (one on either side of the case for cross-case air flow), and the lid is cut and just need to glue hinges to it. If i ever need to use the PCI slots i will dremel some holes into the case in the apropriate place.
The hdd is mounted horizontally, because there wasnt enough room to mount vertically... will see how it goes.. if it fails i will look into mounting it vertically. It is suspended on anti-vibration pnumatic pump feet which i found lying around at work. it seems to work ok so far!
Here are some photos:
3/4 view of case
HDD mounting method
close up of HDD mounts
close up of OPUS case ventilation
Update
05/01/2006 and 06/01/2006
Progress has been slow.. but to motivate myself i ripped out the original radio, and installed the dash/screen unit back in the car. So now i have no radio/cd, so hopefully ill get my arse into gear and install the rest of the hardware! Sorry about the dark photos. Will take some better daylight ones tomorrow.
Finally got around to installing all the power wiring for pc, xenarc and amp.
4G to distro block and then 8G x 2 for pc and amp.
Tapped into the accessory power for the original stereo for the remote line for opus and amp.
Ran fig 8 power wire from pc up to xenarc (powering xenarc from opus)
Ran usb and vga extension leads from PC up to xenarc.
(PC is going under front passenger seat.)
Photos in the morning hopefully after i get the pc in and do a first test run in the car! exciting. well for me anyway!