Cool new polycarbonate (transparent) prototypes

Click to enlarge.





Quality is very high! This is the result of testing out MANY companies... not everyone is reliable here in China but if you're willing to put in the hard work you will find some rare gems of quality and reliability.



In this case they managed to get true transparent surfaces by using special machines and lots of hand work - last PC prototype we got (long time ago) was really rough and it was not mirror finish. These samples are probably not as smooth as real molded mirror finish parts but smooth enough to actually see clearly through them.

First of all, why did we make these parts?

1- test out the USB connector hole on the remote

2- test out the light pipe on the remote

3- test spray painting on both parts

4- test the polycarbonate look

5- these will also be very useful to test waterproofing - because we won't have to open the enclosure every time to see if water went in.

Even before we receive these parts we can already detect a possible little cosmetic problem... they are transparent! And so all the inside features are visible, including

- unsightly thin portion of the remote's top half near the USB connector (but this will be covered by the overlay so it will only be visible near the edge)

- everything on the receiver (screw holes, bosses...)

Thinking of it, we don't remember seeing any real 3d surfaces with bosses and everything spray painted from the inside before, which is what we intended on doing. Normally PC parts painted inside are flat or mostly flat, like hard drive enclosures, cell phone enclosures... Oh well, this is not a huge problem, it may even look good if we spray paint with white, then you'll see all those nice shapes and it will have a unique look.

We'll experiment with colors... A new idea is to just use white plastic; the whole point behind using PC was to be able to leave a triangle for the LED to shine through on the waterproof receiver, but we've since discovered that this shines through white plastic perfectly well too...

Lots of fun ahead as we experiment with different techniques and colors :)

Another trick we can try is that of having some portions of a single part in mirror finish and some other portions in matte or textured; this will create a unique effect only rarely seen in consumer electronics (it will look as if the part is made up of subparts). But what we don't have is the freedom to change the mold several times as that is costly and time consuming and we really need to launch instead of playing with the look too much... so we'll experiment with paint, take our best shot and FIRE away with this product ASAP!

Comments

By Lance_Lake at 2010-06-02 07:15:07 Reply

Can we get the option of leaving the unit (not the remote) clear? Even if it isn't that pretty, I like the idea of seeing all the electronics.

By dreamloverlabs at 2010-06-02 08:19:28 Reply

Well if we indeed go with polycarbonate, perhaps because we're spray painting inside or whatever, then it won't be too hard to offer a clear version too. It would also be beneficial to test waterproofing in the beginning (before you put the electronics inside)...

By johnsteed at 2010-06-03 10:16:13 Reply

Sadly, I have to agree that the "paint the inside" concept probably will look a bit weird. Who knows -- it might end up looking quite unique. But when I think about it, having all the different angles of the clear plastic between your eyes and the paint will definitely be "different." Probably why it's not a technique that's widely used.



With the exception of the "LED light shine through" problem, I'd think colored plastic is the way to go.