Slimmer Alternative to Altoids as a Project Box?

[rdl]

Here's another idea. Go to eBay or Amazon and search for either aluminum wallet or aluminum credit card holder.

[JBaughb]

I've been getting by cutting square (or rectangle) pieces of acrylic and using stand-offs to sandwich my PCBs. Looks nice plus I get to admire my solder work.

[kb0nly]

I just draw one up in CAD and send it over to my 3d printers... LOL

Having two printers is nice, one prints the lid, one prints the bottom, and i snap my finished board into it and off i go.  Also nice not having to drill the holes, just print in place whatever i need.  Quite convenient now that Radio Shack is dead.  I used to buy the cheap little project boxes from them locally, now my only option is to get online and order some from afar.  I live in state with Digi-Key here in MN, so i can get an order from them in two days, but the cases and project boxes they have are pretty spendy.

If i want one with a metal cover i just grab a sheet of aluminum from the hardware store and place it on my little CNC Router, makes nice cutouts for a front panel, if need square i take a sheet metal nipper and square up the corners after machining. 

So yep, i just make them now, custom fit to the board that i also make myself.

[ivan747]

Can you do a tutorial on industry standard project boxes? Like back in the day. 

Pretty sure I already mentioned these in one of the PSU videos.
Also extruded aluminium cases (but they aren't standard).
Actually the ones I showed above are as close to being the most widely copied case I am aware of. Jaycar have them, Altronics, have them, Digikey et.al have them, and many sellers on Alibaba have them. And from what I've seen, would be at least half a dozen different makers of them.
Hammond boxes are copied quite a lot.
Anyone got any others that are multi-source?

Perhaps a list of multi-source boxes? I'm sure you can capitalize that with some adsense in the side or something. Maybe a blog post. 

[vk3yedotcom]

I have no idea why people use metal Altoids tins for projects, cheap hobby project boxes, "jiffy boxes" we call them here, are only a few bucks.

One reason is that metal is required due to RF shielding. 

In some cases, again often with RF projects, you may wish to shield modules within a larger case and Altoids tins can work for that.

Printed circuit board material is an alternative but can be expensive (some of the cheap stuff on eBay doesn't take heat well) and requires special effort
 if you want to enclose all six sides and make it easily openable. 

A metal alternative is Eclipse mints containers. You often see them on the street. They're narrower than Altoids containers but with their end door are
harder to mount parts in.  But they're still an option for projects with few controls and sockets.

If you don't need metal then NZ-made Sistema food containers are good (and also favoured by geocachers).  They sometimes come up for half price at
supermarkets.

Eucapyptus oil is good for cleaning Tic Tac boxes, but like Eclipse Mints require the innards to be slid in from the end. 

[westfw]

You know that bare metal candy tins are a SUPPLY made for the custom candy idustry, and you can buy them in bulk and all sorts of sizes from the appropriate vendors.   Here's one:  http://www.papermart.com/metal-containers/id=19037-INDEX

[cdev]

Thank you!

Perfect!

For example:

http://www.papermart.com/hinged-rectangular-tin-cans/id=23271#23271

[smjcuk]

Those are steel. Look for tin ones or you'll end up with rust everywhere and that's not fun when you find your doohickey in the bottom of a draw a couple of years later and it's gone brown and skanky

Plus tin ones take solder a bit better.

[VK5RC]

You miss out on the mints!! 

[cdev]

Those are steel. Look for tin ones or you'll end up with rust everywhere ....

Yes- of course- But I have not seen a real tin box in years- I would love to have real tin, do you know where they sell real tin boxes?

[smjcuk]

You can get them from antique dealers and shops. They usually throw the ones out that have no commercial interest. Phone and ask if they have any scrap tin. In my case I found a box of them in my grandfather's house when we were clearing it out.

New ones are pricey due to the scarcity of tin at the moment.

[TimFox]

Except for expensive antiques made from solid tin, the old "tin" boxes and cans were tin-plated steel.
Be careful about pure tin:  it is available from hobby (model-train) stores and industrial supply, but it will melt easily when hit with a good soldering iron.  Sn melts at 232 C,  Sn63Pb37 solder melts at 183 C.  A soldering iron set for 600 F is about 315 C.

[vk3yedotcom]

Charity shops are another good source.  Typically $1-2 for a large box.

[westfw]

The point of buying them as a commodity is that ... they're a commodity, and you can get as many identical boxes as you want; usually in a variety of sizes.

The link I posted definitely says "steel", while I find some wholesale places that advertise "tin plated steel" (which is probably what you want for rust resistance, unless you're painting.)  But the latter are in China, and are wholesalers advertising what they might sell to your company ("contact us!"), rather than places that sell reasonable quantities via the web.  So who knows what's real.

[SeanB]

Tin boxes these days are generally steel sheet protected with a thin coat of a clear lacquer. This is applied to the sheet after cleaning and printing, and before it is drawn and formed into the final object. Food grade tins ( typically the sealed ones) have an added internal layer added during manufacture to keep the inside metal from contacting the metal case in storage. Those which use a lid that you pull off do not have this, they rely on the product being in an inner extra layer of plastic sheet, paper or foil to provide this protection.

If you use a metal box then the simplest way to provide extra protection inside is to simply use some light oil on a cloth and wipe the inside out before using, and if you want the best long term protection take some light natural colour cardboard, cut out a square about the size of a business card and coat it with light spray oil ( WD40, pretty much any light machine oil that is not silicone based) and pop it in the finished box just before you close it. You then have this card slowly releasing volatile light components to protect the inner metal for a long time.

Outside either wipe with the oily cloth or degrease and put a light coat of spray paint on it, making sure the bottom has at least 2 coats of paint applied. If you want to keep the original finish clear lacquer works well.