Here's the side panel cutout. Rather than going to the trouble of doing a whole lot of Dremel work to put the ATX cutout directly in the plastic, I found an easier way. I just sliced out a side of the case, which allowed a standard ATX shield plate to fit in.

The top didn't go on right away - some clips there needed a little grinding in order to fit over the metal plate. Also visible in this picture is the second network card cutout. This was originally to serve as a router, so it was going to need two NIC's - one onboard, one in a PCI slot.

There's a nylon piece, epoxied in place. It, and several others served as standoffs for the motherboard.

There's a nice close-up to give an idea of some of the space constraints I had to deal with. The floppy drive cable is less than one millimeter away from the CPU socket.

Here is a late picture, showing the final placement of all the components, as well as the new AX-7 heatsink on the CPU. The motherboard is mounted as well, using 6/32 screws and locking nuts. You can also see the front USB ports. One small problem arose though around this time. There was so little of the original case left, and the components were so heavy, that the thing needed reinforcement.

A long metal rod was left over from the original scanner - it was the rail along which the CCD assembly and light moved. I cut it roughly in half, and then sliced up some metal conduit holders so they could hold the rods in place on the bottom of the scanner.

This is what the holders looked like when mounted. However, two of these were directly under the motherboard, and were actually contacting it. Can't have that now, can we?

A nylon screw, and a nylon nut. These were later coated with epoxy to hold them securely in place. No danger of short circuits here.

Here is how the reinforced base would look. This was actually taken before anything was mounting - again, sorry, but I didn't really plan out the whole chronology of the picture-taking. And I was constantly redesigning the project as it was being built.

Ok, so I'd already used one component from the original scanner. Why not the light? The original inverter ran on 15V, but no matter, 12V inverters are easy enough to find.

There's the lighting "kit" - the light itself, and an inverter from a CCFL lighting kit, purchased online years ago for a case mod. The connector on the flourescent tube was apparently of a universal kind, so it plugged right into the new inverter.

This picture was taken in complete darkness, save the light inside the scanner PC. This was taken after the project was completed and running; and it seems it was also taken as the camera was moving

These two pictures were taken in the same external lighting. The only difference is the lighting on the inside. Granted the change is subtle at this angle, but it is there. The nifty part of it is that there's nothing special to do to turn the light on. It turns on when the lid is opened, courtesy of a little switch toward the back of the case. I had wanted to use a reed switch, but they are SPST, and are normally open. I needed a switch with a normally closed option. I could have used a relay with a reed switch, but that would have added complexity. So I went with a simple pushbutton SPDT switch. It was attached with some wire ties (top and bottom), and activated by a carefully carved toothpick epoxied to the lid. The toothpick fit into a tiny hole I drilled in the top half of the case, and pressed the switch within.

That's it for the construction of this rather unusual system. Time for the full portraits.

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