Thread: Hoe-Puter -- 2001 Chevy Tahoe

I got a PM requesting a how to on building the case, so here's a basic walk-through.

Originally Posted by kilimats

Hi there,

saw your worklog

i was wondering how you built the Plexiglases computer case... any DIY out there ?

Well, I don't know of any DIY guides out there, because to my knowlege, I'm the first person to do it like this. It may not be the first time it's been done, but it was an original idea to me. This is how I did it:

I just used a heat gun to heat it enough to bend it. I clamped it to a flat surface with a sharp corner (a 1"x4") , to bend the corners. You only need to hold it in position for a few seconds before it hardens back up.

To start, cut a sheet that is as long and wide as you want your case, plus the height you want, times two (one for each side).

For example, If you want an 8x10 box that is 4" high, you need a sheet that is 16x18". 8"x10", then 4" height, (times two) means you add 8" to each of your original measurements. (8+8 by 10+8 = 16" by 18").

Cut a a square out of the corners the size of the height you want, in this case, 4" squares out of each corner. Then clamp it on the line you want to bend minus the radius of the bend (or about the thickness of the plexiglass) by "behind" this means you want it on the inside of the box (the flat part, not the sides).

Once your corners are cut out, clamp it to your bending surface. Then heat it slowly and evenly with a heat gun while applying light pressure so you can gauge the flexability of the plexi. When you feel it start to flex, support it so that it doesn't warp and, continue to apply heat for several seconds until it is VERY flexible. If you don't wait long enough, you may crack the plexi glass (like I did in one corner). If that happens, you can weld it back up later, but it won't be pretty.



Then just bend it over the corner of your surface. And use something else flat (I used another board) to press it down and make a good solid bend. You need to keep pressure on it for about 30 seconds while it cools, because it will try to return to its original state (flat).

The first two sides are easy. For the second two, you will need your bending surface to be the same length so that it will fit inside the box you are bending. Use a T-square to make sure the angles are right. This can be tricky, so get creative with your clamping, etc.

After you bend the first two sides, use a soldering iron to melt the corners together in a "tack weld" to keep it in the right position while it cools. You may need to re-heat it a few times to get everything right... Anyway, once all the bending is done, use the soldering iron to weld the corners together completely. You may need to add a small amount of material to get a good solid weld. You can use small scraps of plexi glass as "welding rod".

If you accidentally crack anything, just use the soldering iron and a bit of "welding rod" to "weld" it back.

I used the same method to bend a couple of brackets in a right angle. Then drill a hole in each bracket. Use the soldering iron to fuse the brackets to the box, and you're good to go. A good way to weld two surfaces together is to just slowly push the soldering iron all the way through both surfaces. It makes a sort of "plug weld".



For the bottom of the case, I just cut a sheet of plexi glass to size. I then took two strips of plexi glass the length of the HDD, and half the height I wanted the HDD to be mounted at. I bent them lengthwise and drilled holes that matched the mounting screws on the HDD. I then mounted these new brackets to an old HDD (incase I damaged it with the soldering iron), and placed it where I wanted the harddrive mounted. I took the soldering iron and used the "plug weld" method to attach them to the bottom sheet. Then I went around the edges of the brackets to make sure they were fused to the bottom sheet very well.




That's about it. Hope this helps.

Any updates for us

Oh and your speedtest results.......... one of these days..........

To be honest, not much has changed since I last updated. The cold weather kinda put a damper on my progress (I don't have a garage), and it's just started getting warm a few weeks ago. On top of that, my Dremel too died on me around the time it started getting cold, and I just got a new one a few weeks ago.

I bought a boat last fall, and all my spare time right now is going to working on that, and getting it ready for summer. It'll probably be another 3-4 weeks of working on that, before I get her sea-worthy, and then I still need to reupholster it, and get it prepped for some fresh paint!

I'm also going to be converting all of my vehicles (including this boat) to run on CNG (Compressed Natural Gas). Paying $0.63/gallon for gas will be freaking sweet, but the conversions are going to take some work... I'm thinking it would be cool to use phidgets to have the carputer control the switching between fuel sources. Just touch a button to switch to gasoline, or switch back to CNG...

Anyway, on top of all my projects, I'm also in the process of setting up a business. It'll mean a lot more money, but it also means a lot less time. Hopefully, after 6-8 weeks, I'll have everything running smoothly, and I'll be able to slow down a bit.

Perhaps once I've got some more money, I can add some stuff to the 'Hoe. I have a goal to at least finish this stage of the build. I did get the heater controls moved. I'm basically just a little bit of cosmetic work away from having it how I want it. Everything else from there on out will just be add-ons, like XM radio, and backup cams, etc.

I finally gave up on looking for a slot-loading DVD drive for now, and bought a regular tray-loading DVD drive. It's semi-permanent at this point. Though it's still not screwed to the mounting bracket... It stays put for now, even if it's totally ghetto.

The tray-load is not as cool as the slot-loader would be, but I rarely need to use CDs/DVDs anyway. With a 250 GB Hdd, and a constant internet connection, all the music I want, is literally at my fingertips.

My wife bought me an Apple bluetooth keyboard for my birthday back in Feb. It's pretty sweet, and it fits perfectly on the center console. It also looks really cool.




I'm unsatisfied with the audio too. The front speakers sound great (despite a tiny bit of alternator whine that I still need to fix). They get loud enough for normal to moderately-loud listening, but for certain songs, I sometimes wish it had just a bit more juice. The rear speakers are utterly weak. Despite the signal being run through line-drivers, they just don't make much sound. I tried re-wiring it, so I'd be using shorter wires, but that didn't seem to help much. I also discovered that my driver-side rear door speaker is blown, and distorting. I panned the rear speakers over to the right for now, but since they're so quiet anyway, it didn't make much difference. It did get rid of the subtle distortion of the blown speaker though.

It looks like I'm going to have to go ahead and just install an after-market amp, in order to get the sound I'm looking for. Still need to figure out how I'm going to go about installing the two 12" subs as well... But that's all part of "Stage 2", which may not come any time soon.

I guess my biggest update is that there's not much to update on.

Here's a picture of the console with the A/C controls moved, and the DVD drive installed. As you can see, the controls need about another 1" of clearance in order to fit flush. A little more work with my trusty new Dremel should take care of that. My real camera crapped out a few months back, and I haven't had the motivation to spend the money on a new one, so I've just had to settle for my phone's camera. Sorry for the crappy quality.

We must be brothers from another mother. I swear your project is where I want to go with mine. My time is taken up by 4 kids and barely get any time to wash my baby let alone work on it.

For the subs look at this I cannot find another picture of a box with (3) 12's in the same location with the spare tire covering the box (looks stock).


Anyway good luck on your business and post up when your CNG conversion is done, it sounds very interesting fif the price is right.

I feel ya. I haven't washed the Hoe in about 3 weeks. I'm gonna take it to the car wash this evening... When you get ready to do your project, let me know. I can probably give you some pointers on how to do things the easy way.

Depending on how I do this CNG conversion, I may be putting some tanks in the cargo area, and building a platform over them. If that's the case, I'll just fiberglass some sub boxes into the empty space around the tanks, and maximize the efficiency of that space... If I'm going to lose space for subs, or for tanks, I might as well use it for both.

Anyway, it really depends on your area whether "the price it right" for a conversion. Here in Utah, CNG is equal to paying $0.63/gallon. With gas at over $3.80, and projected to be over $5 this year, your fuel savings will pay for it very quickly. The fuel savings to me, would equate to about enough money to pay the loan on the vehicle every month...

Since I'm putting CNG in my boat, we did the math. On average, you'll go through a fill-up in a weekend. My boat holds 65 gallons of gasoline. So at $3.85, it would cost me $250 for ONE WEEKEND!!! On the other hand, with CNG, I could boat all weekend for 40 bucks...

Lots has changed since my last update on the Hoeputer. I spilled a 40 ounce Dr. Pepper on my power supply while I had the cover off, so it went to Computer Heaven.

I after months of being out of commission, I finally ordered an M3-ATX DC-DC PSU. I ordered the cable to be able to program it with start-up/shut-down settings.

Out of the box, the cable wouldn't connect. Not a big deal, I told myself, so sent off an e-mail to Mini-Box, and decided to just let ride.

Then about a week later, I went out to start my vehicle after work, and my battery was completely dead. I jumped it off, started it up, computer came on, and off I went.

When I got home, I turned off the car, and watched to see if the computer would hibernate. It did not. I started having to manually shut it down. I cleared the memory back to factory defaults, but it still wouldn't shut down. After a day or two of that, it stopped doing either. I have to manually shut down. And then to start up, I have to cut power to the PSU and plug it back in. I can leave the ignition sense wire unplugged, and it will boot.

Anyway, I wrote an e-mail to Mini-Box, but haven't gotten any response.

While I was out of carputing, a new version of Road Runner came out, so I've reinstalled that. Still haven't got RR Cam running yet.

Got A Phoenix Gold 10v. 6 channel line driver, which sounds great. Unfortunately, the factory amp that I've been using doesn't like having much voltage at all, and is pretty noisy. I'll probably have to bite the bullet and get a real amp one of these days. At any rate, the line driver is worlds better than the crappy $6 Ebay line drivers that I had previously been using.

I finally ordered some USB pin header ports for my board, so I don't have to use a hub anymore.

I've installed my ELM327 and installed the OBDII software from mjo151.

Also, while my carputer was out of commission, I converted the Tahoe to run on CNG. I'll be integrating the CNG ECM programing software at some point in the future, to set up different fuel maps for different driving conditions (such as towing, etc), but that will come later.

Also finally got started painting those ugly rims. I'll post pics when I'm done.

Just a few things I wanted to add here assuming you have not solved you problems yet. I can see this is an older thread but I believe I can help.

1. PC not hibernating: I have not used one of those mini-itx power supplies that automatically hibernates the PC but I am famliar with them. I believe they connect a 2 small wires to your power switch connector on the motherboard and simulate pressing the power button when the iginition is turned off.

To activate the hibernation or stand-by feature you must make the changes in teh XP power settings menu. Control Panel -> Power Options -> advanted tab - There is a drop box to select what you computer should do when the power or sleep button is pressed. Select either stand-by or hibernate and that should correct your problem.

2. If you don't want to build a dedicated computer (next time) I like to use laptops for my carputers. You can get fairly decent ones used for only a few hundred bucks that have WI-FI, Bluetooth (maybe), larger harddrives, VGA outputs, and all the other connectors you need. they are also slim enough to fit under the seat. If you look for used ones with broken LCDs you can get them for like $50 or even for free. Add an external touchscreen and you are done

The only thing is that you need a power inverter so that you can plug the laptop in but because they have built in batteries and and A/C adapters they handle the power instability from a vehicle very well and they have their own keyboards and mice (touchpad/poiniting stick). Another downfall is the location of the power switch but I'll leave that up to the end user to find away around that.

Hope those carputers work out for you.

The hibernating issue was actually caused by the PSU itself. It had nothing to do with the computer hardware.

At this point though, the hoeputer is completely removed from my Tahoe. The screen stopped working, and I haven't had the time or the money to try to mess with getting the screen operational again.

Also decided to pull the computer itself out for the time being, because I was experimenting with a HTPC, and needed the hardware for now.

If I ever get around to putting it back in, I'll update this thread with the latest info. I still have a lot of cosmetic work to do to get everything integrated properly, and get the Tahoe interior all put back together. As it is right now, I don't even have a center console in there...