Last year I found a supplier on eBay in the UK that was selling some neat looking flat pack steel rack cases in various sizes, apart from 5U unfortunately. In November, I decided to ask the question whether they could make other sizes, which I was pleasantly surprised to find they were willing to do. Roll on to December and they told me the cases were available.
All Metal Parts on eBay UK
The rack cases arrived as flat packs only 2 days after I ordered them on eBay, along with some flat panels and ventilation panels I ordered at the same time. They were very well wrapped in plenty of bubble wrap and cardboard. Here's how one of the flat pack cases arrived:
The rack cases are made from 1.2mm steel and are powder coated in black. All exposed edges are folded as well, so there are no sharp edges to worry about. Assembly was a breeze, with only 8 screws needed to assemble each case. These screw into proper threaded bushes as well, no self tappers here. The racks also came with 20 captive nuts and the associated screws and washers for mounting equipment to the built in rack rails. The racks are 300mm deep, which is a little deep for MOTM modules, but I plan to build some Formant modules that will need the 300mm depth, so I'll stick with this depth for now.
Other little things I like about these cases are that there are dimples on the top and bottom panels that means the cases link with each other. There is also a knockout towards the middle back of the top and bottom panels if you want to link the cases together and pass cables between the cases without having to go externally. I will probably get some thin rubber feet to fit into the bottom dimple so that the cases locate a bit neater and don't mark tables or each other.
For the Power Supply and distribution, I got an Oakley PSU2 and another Dizzy (I already had one in stock already). The Yamaha PA-30 PSU lump for this PSU came from Thomann. Going the PSU2 route means that there are no issues with mains power, cables, earths and transformers in this build. I got similar connectors to the PA-30 to make a link cable between the two chassis. All of these orders were placed and delivered in 2012.
Here's the PSU and Dizzy's assembled and mounted on the 3U aluminium panels:
Last picture is a not very exciting rear view:
Being a bit pedantic, I'm going to order some black M3 screws to finish this build off. I also need to order some more MOTM rails from Bridechamber when he gets them in stock.
Overall I'm very pleased with these results. I can see me building quite a few more of these (another 5 pairs should give me enough space for the modules on my build list). I will probably get a couple of 6U cases as well, for some Formant modules I've got the PCB's for.
Last but no means least, I got the impression that All Metal Parts are quite amenable for slightly more custom builds. For example, they built 10 of these 5U cases in only a few weeks based on my initial request for only a pair. I suspect that narrower cases should also be possible if there was enough demand.
Hope you find this interesting and useful
Regards
Magman
) for Dotcom modules. 
