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New cab or modular piece cp...?!?

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Doc-:
Here's the key:
  The panel slides under the bezel and then locks down on dowels drilled in rails both front and back.  There are holes in the bottom of each panel which match the dowel locations exactly.

  In this picture I propped a joystick panel up on the back dowels/rail and under the bezel showing the position it might be in just prior to inserting it.  You rotate the panel down onto the back dowels which locks the back lip of the panel under the bezel.  The panel also gets set onto matching dowels in the front dowel rail.   You can also see the edge of the two RJ45 wall outlets and my slide out keyboard tray below the panel.

  This gives each panel only one degree of freedom.  All other movement is stopped by the dowels, rails or bezel.  You basically have to pull the panel straight up from the front edge to loosen it at all.

  The only panels you pull up while playing are joysticks - so each of these panels has a roller cabinet latch on the inside front edge.  The other panels don't require a latch.

  The setup is surprisingly robust so far.  Pressing the joystick forward (even very very hard) does not generate enough moment on the cabinet latch to break the seal because you have a 3" arm working to rotate a 11" panel with a latch at the end of it.  You basically have to yank the joystick straight up (i.e. vertically towards your nose - not a normal direction of movement) very hard to break it loose during play.  On the other hand you can easily lift the front edge of the panel up with your hand and overcome the roller latch to swap the panel.  

  Just pop the front edge up, wiggle it off the back dowels a bit and then pop the new one in and press the front edge down.  Each panel has one RJ45 or one USB plug (i.e. for trackball or spinner), so there is no real work there - you can hot swap all of the panels - both USB and RJ45.

telengard:

--- Quote from: Mortalpawn on April 11, 2004, 12:03:06 am ---Here's the key:
  The panel slides under the bezel and then locks down on dowels drilled in rails both front and back.  There are holes in the bottom of each panel which match the dowel locations exactly.

  In this picture I propped a joystick panel up on the back dowels/rail and under the bezel showing the position it might be in just prior to inserting it.  You rotate the panel down onto the back dowels which locks the back lip of the panel under the bezel.  The panel also gets set onto matching dowels in the front dowel rail.   You can also see the edge of the two RJ45 wall outlets and my slide out keyboard tray below the panel.

  This gives each panel only one degree of freedom.  All other movement is stopped by the dowels, rails or bezel.  You basically have to pull the panel straight up from the front edge to loosen it at all.

  The only panels you pull up while playing are joysticks - so each of these panels has a roller cabinet latch on the inside front edge.  The other panels don't require a latch.

  The setup is surprisingly robust so far.  Pressing the joystick forward (even very very hard) does not generate enough moment on the cabinet latch to break the seal because you have a 3" arm working to rotate a 11" panel with a latch at the end of it.  You basically have to yank the joystick straight up (i.e. vertically towards your nose - not a normal direction of movement) very hard to break it loose during play.  On the other hand you can easily lift the front edge of the panel up with your hand and overcome the roller latch to swap the panel.  

  Just pop the front edge up, wiggle it off the back dowels a bit and then pop the new one in and press the front edge down.  Each panel has one RJ45 or one USB plug (i.e. for trackball or spinner), so there is no real work there - you can hot swap all of the panels - both USB and RJ45.

--- End quote ---

Very nice indeed!

I definitely like the RJ45 idea, is it expensive?  I use molex connectors which are OK, but not the easiest thing to deal with.  I don't think I'm good enough w/ woodworking to do the dowels.  The rack panels I use are idiot proof.   :)

Doc-:
No the RJ45's were not that expensive.   I searched around the internet a bit and found the "wall socket" inserts for < $3 each.  These just snap into two wall socket panels which cost only a buck or two.  

The cables for each panel are made from 3 foot patch panels cut in half.  These are a bit short so you need to be careful when wiring, but they are long enough for my layout.  Half of a 5 foot cable would be better.  Again, I searched around online and found 3' patch cables for $1.50 each.

Totalling it up - I had around 8 sockets (I have duplicates for each button set and joystick to let me have two joysticks do the same thing - as well as a control button socket) and used 4 patch cables - so that comes to somewhere around $30.  Considering the number of panels (8 wired with RJ45) and ease of use factor - that is not too bad.

The 4 port USB hub I bought about a year ago for < $10.  Go to pricewatch.com and you can find one very cheap - even with shipping.

The picture shows the patch panel.  The IPAQ sits on the back side in the center of the panel.  The hanging object on the right is the USB hub (not too elegant - but I had it laying around).

telengard:

--- Quote from: Mortalpawn on April 11, 2004, 01:38:20 am ---No the RJ45's were not that expensive.   I searched around the internet a bit and found the "wall socket" inserts for < $3 each.  These just snap into two wall socket panels which cost only a buck or two.  

The cables for each panel are made from 3 foot patch panels cut in half.  These are a bit short so you need to be careful when wiring, but they are long enough for my layout.  Half of a 5 foot cable would be better.  Again, I searched around online and found 3' patch cables for $1.50 each.

Totalling it up - I had around 8 sockets (I have duplicates for each button set and joystick to let me have two joysticks do the same thing - as well as a control button socket) and used 4 patch cables - so that comes to somewhere around $30.  Considering the number of panels (8 wired with RJ45) and ease of use factor - that is not too bad.

The 4 port USB hub I bought about a year ago for < $10.  Go to pricewatch.com and you can find one very cheap - even with shipping.

The picture shows the patch panel.  The IPAQ sits on the back side in the center of the panel.  The hanging object on the right is the USB hub (not too elegant - but I had it laying around).

--- End quote ---

The RJ45 idea is great.  I'm now thinking of switching over all of my modular panels to it except using RJ11 instead since at most I have 3 wires used.  The reason why it would be a good change is because I would only need two hands to plug the control module in.   Right now w/ molex connectors I pretty much need 3 hands.  1 to hold the control, 1 to hold the male molex, and one to hold the female molex.  I should have thought this through more.

So are the RJ45 keystone things easy to crimp or impact?  Do the wires stay put in there?

jerryjanis:
The rj-45 wall-mounting things really look nice!  I'm using an ugly set of molex connectors.  It works very well, and was really cheap, but I wish I knew about the possiblity of using your system!  Looks great!

Here are some basic pics of my system:





Not pretty, but very functional.

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