Hi, can anyone advise me how to affix aluminum panels to the chassis skeleton so that there would be no visible screws on the front, top and sides? Screws at the back and bottom are OK. Is using a very thick sheet with partially drilled screw holes the only way or are there any other clever methods? The chassis that I will be building will be very close to a standard cuboid (I think that's how you call it in English - a 3D shape with rectangular walls)
I have used small neodymium magnets which are very strong for their size (get them on ebay) to hold the filters on the fans on my latest build "AL-13 duplicity" and I will also be using them to hold the hinged panels shut and I will probably be using them in my next build to hold panels to the chassis, just don't put them too close to HDD/SSD''s Drilled some holes and pressed the magnets into place same on filter covers and they aren't going anywhere. If you use these magnets check the specs for them in the advert as they give the calculated Pull and the vertical Hold, the magnets I linked to on ebay have a pull of 4.3 pounds and are nearly impossible to just pull apart you have to slide them apart, I think if you have one in each corner of a panel or maybe three on each side the panel will be very secure. If you don't want to drill holes in your panels you could make small holders for the magnets and stick them to the inside of the panel.
Will it be painted afterwards? What i did with my project: i used M3 countersunk schrews in a 1.5mm thick aluminum profiles with nuts on the inside made the countersunk holes as deep as the schrew heads and glue them in place, sand it down and paint it No visable schrews on the outside PS:i can post a picture tonight if you want
Unfortunately I don't have appropriate facilities to paint (I'm renting a room in a shared house, the paint stench would kill my housemates + paint dust everywhere and the weather outside is mostly horrible (UK). What I was thinking about was to cover the final product in self adhesive vinyl (used for car body work) but even then I would prefer to not have the screws showing on the outside to get a nice minimalistic look. Your method sounds good to me but I'll probably use countersunk rivets. However I think that there has to be some more options to attach the panels without the fixings being visible. Aluminium can be very easily polished to look uber cool so it's a shame to cover it with paint:/
Unless you're using something like this, magnets near rotating hard drives really aren't a problem anymore. You could stick your SSD to your case with a magnet and not hurt it.
What if you glue/solder/weld the metal version of this: http://www.overclockers.co.uk/showproduct.php?prodid=CA-339-LL&campaign=pcm/googleshopping&pup_c=gs
Good luck with that, the 12mm neodymium magnets I used can lift 4 pounds so very powerful for their size
